chalk

[chawk]

noun

1. a soft, white, powdery limestone consisting chiefly of fossil shells of foraminifers.

2. a prepared piece of chalk or chalklike substance for marking, as for writing on a blackboard.

3. a mark made with chalk.

4. a score or tally.

5. Sports Slang.,  the competitor considered most likely to win by the oddsmakers; favorite.

   If you don’t know anything about either team, just bet the chalk.

verb (used with object)

1. to mark or write with chalk.

2. to rub over or whiten with chalk.

3. to treat or mix with chalk.

   to chalk a billiard cue.

4. to make pale; blanch.

   Terror chalked her face.

verb (used without object)

1. (of paint) to powder from weathering.

adjective

1. of, made of, or drawn with chalk.

verb phrase

1. chalk up

   1. to score or earn.

      They chalked up two runs in the first inning.

   2. to charge or ascribe to.

      It was a poor performance, but may be chalked up to lack of practice.

chalk

/ tʃɔːk /

noun

1. a soft fine-grained white sedimentary rock consisting of nearly pure calcium carbonate, containing minute fossil fragments of marine organisms, usually without a cementing material

2. a piece of chalk or a substance like chalk, often coloured, used for writing and drawing on a blackboard

3. a line, mark, etc made with chalk

4. billiards snooker a small cube of prepared chalk or similar substance for rubbing the tip of a cue

5. a score, tally, or record

6. informal,  totally different in essentials

7. informal,  by far

8. to be unable to judge or appreciate important differences

9. informal,  by no means; not possibly

10. (modifier) made of chalk

verb

1. to draw or mark (something) with chalk

2. (tr) to mark, rub, or whiten with or as if with chalk

3. (intr) (of paint) to become chalky; powder

4. (tr) to spread chalk on (land) as a fertilizer

chalk

1. A soft, white, gray, or yellow limestone consisting mainly of calcium carbonate and formed primarily from the accumulation of fossil microorganisms such as foraminifera and calcareous algae. Chalk is used in making lime, cement, and fertilizers, and as a whitening pigment in ceramics, paints, and cosmetics. The chalk used in classrooms is usually artificial.

Other Word Forms

• chalklike adjective
• unchalked adjective
• chalky adjective
• chalkiness noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of chalk¹

First recorded before 900; Middle English chalk, schalk, calk, Old English cealc “plaster, cement”; cognate with Old Saxon calc, Dutch kalk, German Kalch, Kalk, from Latin calc- (stem of calx ) “lime, limestone, quicklime,” from Greek chálix “small stone, rubble, gravel, mortar”

Word History and Origins

Origin of chalk¹

Old English cealc, from Latin calx limestone, from Greek khalix pebble

Example Sentences

They had not spoken since their first interview, which Penelope chalked up to him being busy and perhaps shy, never mind the fact that she did not speak Norwegian.

Read more on Literature

“And where did you get the chalk and the paints?”

Read more on Literature

He would walk into the classroom, take a piece of chalk out of his pocket, go straight to the blackboard, and begin.

Read more on Literature

Anti-government slogans written on sidewalks in chalk appeared across Slovakia over the weekend, after police questioned a student over chalk protest messages outside his school against nationalist Prime Minister Robert Fico.

Read more on Barron's

Those who do chalk it up to well-connected alumni, fortuitous timing and a leader focused on steering the campus back toward the political center.

Read more on The Wall Street Journal

Related Words

• address 
• compose 
• create 
• draft 
• note 
• pen 
• print 
• record 
• rewrite 
• scrawl 
• scribble 
• sign 
• tell