auk
Americannoun
noun
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any of various diving birds of the family Alcidae of northern oceans having a heavy body, short tail, narrow wings, and a black-and-white plumage: order Charadriiformes See also great auk razorbill auk
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a small short-billed auk, Plautus alle, abundant in Arctic regions
Etymology
Origin of auk
1665–75; < Scandinavian; compare Old Norse alka
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
It’s almost impossible today to comprehend how such ships seized the popular imagination during the vessels’ heyday, which began in 1848, lasted scarcely a decade and vanished as completely as the Great Auk.
From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 8, 2025
Extinct or Alive: Uncovered Evidence Host Forrest Galante travels to the Faroe Islands to look for any trace of the Great Auk, a flightless bird not seen since 1844.
From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 3, 2019
The findings are published in a study on 20 September in The Auk: Ornithological Advances1.
From Nature • Sep. 19, 2017
Two villagers from Auk Nan Yar told Reuters that they too were now unable to get to a market to buy food or to work.
From Reuters • Aug. 22, 2017
I could tell it wasn’t going to go as high as the smaller Auk XIV.
From "October Sky" by Homer Hickam
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
