shake

Meaning

Verb

1. To cause (something) to move rapidly in opposite directions alternatingly.
2. To move (one's head) from side to side, especially to indicate refusal, reluctance, or disapproval.
3. To move or remove by agitating; to throw off by a jolting or vibrating motion.
4. To disturb emotionally; to shock.
5. To lose, evade, or get rid of (something).
6. To move from side to side.
7. To shake hands.
8. To dance.
9. To give a tremulous tone to; to trill.
10. To threaten to overthrow.
11. To be agitated; to lose firmness.

Noun

1. The act of shaking or being shaken; tremulous or back-and-forth motion.
2. A twitch, a spasm, a tremor.
3. A dance popular in the 1960s in which the head, limbs, and body are shaken.
4. A milkshake.
5. A beverage made by adding ice cream to a (usually carbonated) drink; a float.
6. Shake cannabis, small, leafy fragments of cannabis that gather at the bottom of a bag of marijuana.
7. (slang) An adulterant added to cocaine powder.
8. A thin shingle.
9. A crack or split between the growth rings in wood.
10. A fissure in rock or earth.
11. A basic wooden shingle made from split logs, traditionally used for roofing etc.
12. (informal) Instant, second. (Especially in two shakes.)
13. One of the staves of a hogshead or barrel taken apart.
14. A rapid alternation of a principal tone with another represented on the next degree of the staff above or below it; a trill.
15. In singing, notes (usually high ones) sung vibrato.
16. A shook of staves and headings.
17. The redshank, so called from the nodding of its head while on the ground.
18. A shock or disturbance.

Pronounced as (IPA)

/ˈʃeɪk/

Etymology

From Middle English schaken, from Old English sċeacan, sċacan (“to shake”), from Proto-West Germanic *skakan, from Proto-Germanic *skakaną (“to shake, swing, escape”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)keg-, *(s)kek- (“to jump, move”).
Cognate with Scots schake, schack (“to shake”), West Frisian schaekje (“to shake”), Dutch schaken (“to elope, make clean, shake”), Low German schaken (“to move, shift, push, shake”) and schacken (“to shake, shock”), Old Norse skaka (“to shaka”), Norwegian Nynorsk skaka (“to shake”), Swedish skaka (“to shake”), Danish skage (“to shake”), Dutch schokken (“to shake, shock”), Russian скака́ть (skakátʹ, “to jump”). More at shock.