shark

Pronunciation: /ʃɑɹk/

Reading level: hard

Estimated CEFR level: C1 — Advanced

Estimated from word frequency; not an official CEFR classification.

Definition

  1. noun any of numerous elongate mostly marine carnivorous fishes with heterocercal caudal fins and tough skin covered with small toothlike scales
  2. noun a person who is ruthless and greedy and dishonest
  3. noun a person who is unusually skilled in certain ways

Etymology

From Middle English shark (used by Thomas Beckington in 1442 to refer to a kind of fish), of uncertain origin. Most likely from a semantic extension of the German-derived shark (“scoundrel”), see below. The fish was originally called a dogfish or haye in English and Middle English. Its name in Old English is unknown, although some uses of the word hranfisċ that do not appear to carry the sense of "whale" may have been referencing it. alternative theories Some older dictionaries derived the word from Latin c(h)archarias, c(h)acharus (from Ancient Greek), but admit that "the requisite [Old French] forms intermediate between E. shark and L. carcharus are not found, and it is not certain that the name [shark] was orig. applied to the fish; it may have been first used of a greedy man". Other older authorities speculated that the word might derive from Yucatec Maya xok (“fish”) (/ʃok/), as John Hawkins brought a specimen from the area where Mayan was spoken to England in the 1560s. However, the 1442 use rules out a New World origin for the word.

In classic literature

Semantic network

Broader (hypernyms)
elasmobranch
Narrower (hyponyms)
mackerel shark, carpet shark, cat shark, requiem shark, hammerhead, nurse shark

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