loaf

Meaning

Noun

1. A block of bread after baking.
2. Any solid block of food, such as meat or sugar.
3. (slang) The brain or the head (mainly in the phrase use one's loaf).
4. A solid block of soap, from which standard bar soap is cut.
5. A particular still life configuration with seven living cells.

Verb

1. (slang) To headbutt
2. To assume or be in catloaf position (for cats or other animals)

Verb

To do nothing, to be idle.

Pronounced as (IPA)

/ləʊf/

Etymology

* From Middle English lof, laf, from Old English hlāf (“bread, loaf of bread”), from Proto-West Germanic *hlaib, from Proto-Germanic *hlaibaz (“bread, loaf”), of uncertain origin. Perhaps related to Old English hlifian (“to stand out prominently, tower up”). Cognate with Scots laif (“loaf”), German Laib (“loaf”), Swedish lev (“loaf”), Russian хлеб (xleb, “bread, loaf”), Polish chleb (“bread”); as a borrowing, Finnish leipä (“bread”), Estonian leib (“black bread”). Doublet of chleb and khleb.
* (brain or head): Rhyming slang, shortened from "loaf of bread".