orc

See also: ORC and Orc

English

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ɔɹk/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ɔːk/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔː(ɹ)k

Etymology 1

From Middle French orque, Italian orca, and their source, Latin orca (“type of whale”). Doublet of orca.

Noun

orc (plural orcs)

1. (archaic) Any of several large, ferocious sea creatures, now especially the killer whale. [from 16th c.]

Alternative forms

• ork (obsolete)

Translations

Orcinus orca — see orca

Etymology 2

Savage orc

Probably from Italian orco (“man-eating giant”); later revived by J. R. R. Tolkien, partly after Old English orc, which he took to mean "demon". Both are from Latin Orcus (“the underworld; the god Pluto”). Doublet of ogre and Orcus.

Sense 2 is a semantic loan from Ukrainian орк (ork, “evil monstrous humanoid creature; orc”) or Russian орк (ork), both from the English word and possibly under the influence of Russian у́рка (úrka, “criminal”, prison slang). Popularized in English in 2022, following the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Noun

orc (plural orcs)

1. (fantasy, mythology) A mythical evil monstrous humanoid creature, usually quite aggressive and often green. [from 17th c.]

   Hypernym: greenskin

   • 1656, Samuel Holland, Don Zara del Fogo, I.1:

     Who at one stroke didst pare away three heads from off the shoulders of an Orke, begotten by an Incubus.

   • 1834, "The National Fairy Mythology of England" in Fraser's Magazine for Town and Country, Vol. 10, p. 53:

     The chief exploit of the hero, Beowulf the Great, is the destruction of the two monsters Grendel and his mother; both like most of the evil beings in the old times, dwellers in the fens and the waters; and both, moreover, as some Christian bard has taken care to inform us, of "Cain's kin," as were also the eotens, and the elves, and the orcs (eótenas, and ylfe, and orcneas).

   • 1954, JRR Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring:

     There was a flash like flame and the helm burst asunder. The orc fell with cloven head.

3. (slang, derogatory) A Russian soldier or gangster.
   • 2015, Andrew Wilson, The Ukrainians: Unexpected Nation, page 354:

     Ukrainians themselves, including those on the right, preferred to call the events the 'Revolution of Dignity', depicted not in terms of ethnicity or class, but in simple civic black and white – a revolution of the people against Yanukovych's 'Mordor' and his 'Orcs'.

   • 2022 March 1, Bruno Maçães, “Europe’s Illusion of Peace Has Been Irrevocably Shattered”, in Time:

     And now we must watch the old world go up in flames, in the mad spectacle of Putin’s orcs descending upon Kyiv to execute his macabre plan.

   • 2022 July 25, Michael Wasiura, “Belarusian Exiles Join Ukrainians in Taking Up Arms Against Russia”, in Newsweek‎^[2], retrieved 2022-07-25:

     Plenty of Belarusian exiles have gone to Europe, but if you run West, then the Orcs [a Ukrainian slang term for "Russian soldiers"] will just follow you there. It's better to risk your life as a free person than to keep running.

   • For more quotations using this term, see Citations:orc.
5. (by extension, Internet slang, ethnic slur) A Russian person.

Alternative forms

• ork

Derived terms

(sense 1)

• half-orc
• orcess
• Orcish
• orcish
• she-orc
• SMOrc

 

(senses 2 and 3)

• Orcban
• Orcistan

 

Descendants

Some listed may be semantic loans.

• → Catalan: orc
• → Czech: ork
• → Danish: ork
• → Dutch: ork
• → Estonian: örk
• → Finnish: örkki
• → French: orc
• → Georgian: ორკი (orḳi)
• → Greek: ορκ (ork)
• → Hungarian: ork
• → Icelandic: orki
• → Japanese: オーク (ōku)
• → Korean: 오크 (okeu)
• → Latvian: orks
• → Lithuanian: orkas
• → Marathi: ऑर्क (ŏrka)
• → Norwegian: ork, orc
• → Polish: ork
• → Portuguese: orc
• → Romanian: orc
• → Russian: орк (ork)
• → Serbo-Croatian: ork / орк
• → Swedish: ork
• → Ukrainian: орк (ork)

Translations

evil monstrous humanoid creature

• Arabic: أُورْك m (ʔōrk)
• Armenian: օրկ (ōrk)
• Belarusian: орк m (ork)
• Bulgarian: орк m (ork)
• Catalan: orc (ca)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 半獸人／半兽人 (zh) (bànshòurén), 獸人／兽人 (zh) (shòurén), 奧克／奥克 (àokè), 歐克／欧克 (ōukè)

• Czech: ork m, skřet (cs) m
• Danish: ork c
• Dutch: ork (nl) m
• Esperanto: orko
• Estonian: mäekoll, örk
• Finnish: örkki (fi)
• French: orque (fr) m, orc (fr) m
• Galician: orco
• Georgian: ორკი (orḳi)
• German: Ork (de) m
• Greek: ορκ m or n (ork)
• Hungarian: ork (hu)
• Icelandic: orki m
• Indonesian: gergasi (id)
• Italian: orco (it) m
• Japanese: オーク (ja) (ōku)
• Korean: 오크 (okeu)
• Latvian: orks m
• Lithuanian: orkas m
• Luxembourgish: Ork
• Macedonian: орк m (ork)
• Marathi: ऑर्क m (ŏrka)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: ork m, orc m

• Persian: اورک (fa) (ôrk)
• Polish: ork (pl)
• Portuguese: orc (pt), orque
• Romanian: orc (ro) m
• Russian: орк (ru) m (ork)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: орк m

  Roman: ork m

• Slovak: ohyzd m, ork m, škrat m, škriatok m
• Slovene: ork m
• Spanish: orco (es) m
• Swedish: orch c, ork (sv) c
• Ukrainian: орк (uk) m (ork)

a Russian soldier or gangster

• Armenian: օրկ (ōrk)
• Belarusian: орк m (ork)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 半獸人／半兽人 (zh) (bànshòurén)

• Dutch: ork (nl) m
• Georgian: ორკი (orḳi)
• Hungarian: ork (hu)
• Russian: орк (ru) m (ork)
• Spanish: orco (es) m
• Ukrainian: орк (uk) m (ork)

See also

• ogre
• goblin
• troll
• Nork

Anagrams

• R.O.C., CoR, cro, cor-, roc, Cor., OCR, CRO, RoC, cor., R. O. C., COR, ROC, cor

Catalan

Noun

orc m (plural orcs)

1. an orc

Old English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ork/, [orˠk]

Etymology 1

From Proto-West Germanic *ork.

Noun

orc m (nominative plural orcas)

1. cup, tankard

Declension

Declension of orc (strong a-stem)

Case	Singular	Plural
nominative	orc	orcas
accusative	orc	orcas
genitive	orces	orca
dative	orce	orcum

Etymology 2

From Latin Orcus (“the underworld; the god Pluto”).

Noun

orc m

1. hell
2. a demon

Usage notes

• The sense "demon" is uncertain. Two ambiguous occurrences of orc, one in the plural compound word orcneas in Beowulf (singular orcnē, where *nē means "corpse", as in dryhtnē) and the other in a glossary which glosses Latin Orcus as "orc. þyrs ꝉ hel deofol", have been interpreted to mean "demon" (including by the OED), and Tolkien held this interpretation when he revived the word with a similar sense in modern English, matching some of the Romance descendants of Orcus. However, it has been argued that this is a misunderstanding and that both instances are of the other sense, "hell".

Declension

Declension of orc (strong a-stem)

Case	Singular	Plural
nominative	orc	orcas
accusative	orc	orcas
genitive	orces	orca
dative	orce	orcum

Derived terms

• orcen
• orcþyrs

Old Irish

Etymology

From Proto-Celtic *ɸorkos, from Proto-Indo-European *pórḱos. Cognate with Latin porcus and English farrow.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ork/

Noun

orc m

1. piglet

   Synonym: banb

Declension

Masculine o-stem
	Singular	Dual	Plural
Nominative	orc	orcL	oircL
Vocative	oirc	orcL	orcuH
Accusative	orcN	orcL	orcuH
Genitive	oircL	orc	orcN
Dative	orcL	orcaib	orcaib
Initial mutations of a following adjective: H = triggers aspiration L = triggers lenition N = triggers nasalization

Descendants

• Irish: arc
• Manx: ark

Mutation

Old Irish mutation
Radical	Lenition	Nasalization
orc (pronounced with /h/ in h-prothesis environments)	unchanged	n-orc
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs.

References

• Gregory Toner, Sharon Arbuthnot, Máire Ní Mhaonaigh, Marie-Luise Theuerkauf, Dagmar Wodtko, editors (2019), “orc”, in eDIL: Electronic Dictionary of the Irish Language

Portuguese

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from English orc. Doublet of ogro and orco.

Pronunciation

 

• (Brazil) IPA^(key): /ˈɔʁ.ki/ [ˈɔh.ki]

• (Brazil) IPA^(key): /ˈɔʁ.ki/ [ˈɔh.ki]
  • (São Paulo) IPA^(key): /ˈɔɾ.ki/
  • (Rio de Janeiro) IPA^(key): /ˈɔʁ.ki/ [ˈɔχ.ki]
  • (Southern Brazil) IPA^(key): /ˈɔɻ.ke/

• (Portugal) IPA^(key): /ˈɔɾ.kɨ/

Noun

orc m (plural orcs)

1. (fantasy) orc (evil, monstrous humanoid creature)

   Synonym: orco