cask
Americannoun
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a container made and shaped like a barrel, especially one larger and stronger, for holding liquids.
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the quantity such a container holds.
wine at 32 guineas a cask.
verb (used with object)
noun
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a strong wooden barrel used mainly to hold alcoholic drink
a wine cask
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any barrel
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the quantity contained in a cask
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a lightweight cardboard container with plastic lining and a small tap, used to hold and serve wine
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engineering another name for flask
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of cask
1425–75; late Middle English; back formation from casket, the -et being taken as the diminutive suffix
Explanation
A barrel-shaped container that holds wine or other, usually alcoholic, beverages is called a cask. If you visit a winery, you will often see many rows of wooden wine-filled casks lining the caves and cellars of the winery. If you have a large party, you can open a cask of wine. Experts aren't exactly sure what the origin of the word cask is. They know that it is a noun that comes from the Middle French word casque or the Spanish word casco, and both mean "helmet," but how we got from helmet to wine-filled barrel-shaped container is unclear. Students may have heard of the word cask from Edgar Allan Poe's famous short story of revenge and murder set in a wine cellar, "The Cask of Amontillado."
Vocabulary lists containing cask
We Are Not Free
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The Sun Also Rises
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The Brooklyn Nine
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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.
Two middle-aged Americans, matching orange ringlets marking them as brothers, quizzed the bartender about cask types and chill filtration.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 16, 2026
The most expensive cask she bought – which cost her £49,500 – does not exist.
From BBC • Mar. 26, 2025
Another bottle from the same cask was sold by Sotheby’s in 2019 for almost 1.5 million pounds, until Saturday a record for wine or spirits.
From Seattle Times • Nov. 18, 2023
But Gerry's lament is drawn from a cask of finely aged romance no twenty- or thirtysomething could possibly access, a heretofore unknown cocktail on this show.
From Salon • Sep. 28, 2023
It was a squat little cask, and a tight fit even for a dwarf.
From "A Dance with Dragons" by George R. R. Martin
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.
