sack1
- a large bag of strong, coarsely woven material, as for grain, potatoes, or coal.
- the amount a sack holds.
- a bag: a sack of candy.
- Slang. dismissal or discharge, as from a job: to get the sack.
- Slang. bed: I bet he's still in the sack.
- Also sacque.
- a loose-fitting dress, as a gown with a Watteau back, especially one fashionable in the late 17th century and much of the 18th century.
- a loose-fitting coat, jacket, or cape.
- Baseball. a base.
- South Midland U.S. the udder of a cow.
- to put into a sack or sacks.
- Football. to tackle (the quarterback) behind the line of scrimmage before the quarterback is able to throw a pass.
- Slang. to dismiss or discharge, as from a job.
- sack out, Slang. to go to bed; fall asleep.
- hit the sack, Slang. to go to bed; go to sleep: He never hits the sack before midnight.
- leave holding the sack. bag(def 28).
Origin of sack1
Regional variation note
sack1
- a large bag made of coarse cloth, thick paper, etc, used as a container
- Also called: sackful the amount contained in a sack, sometimes used as a unit of measurement
- a woman's loose tube-shaped dress
- Also called: sacquea woman's full loose hip-length jacket, worn in the 18th and mid-20th centuries
- short for rucksack
- cricket, Australian a run scored off a ball not struck by the batsman: allotted to the team as an extra and not to the individual batsmanAlso called (in Britain and certain other countries): bye
- the sack informal dismissal from employment
- a slang word for bed
- hit the sack slang to go to bed
- rough as sacks NZ uncouth
- informal to dismiss from employment
- to put into a sack or sacks
Word Origin
sack2
- the plundering of a place by an army or mob, usually involving destruction, slaughter, etc
- American football a tackle on a quarterback which brings him down before he has passed the ball
- (tr) to plunder and partially destroy (a place)
- American football to tackle and bring down a quarterback before he has passed the ball
Word Origin
sack3
- archaic or trademark any dry white wine formerly imported into Britain from SW Europe
Word Origin
Word Origin and History for sack out
sack
n.1
"large bag," Old English sacc (West Saxon), sec (Mercian), sæc (Old Kentish) "large cloth bag," also "sackcloth," from Proto-Germanic *sakkiz (cf. Middle Dutch sak, Old High German sac, Old Norse sekkr, but Gothic sakkus probably is directly from Greek), an early borrowing from Latin saccus (also source of Old French sac, Spanish saco, Italian sacco), from Greek sakkos, from Semitic (cf. Hebrew saq "sack").
The wide spread of the word is probably due to the Biblical story of Joseph, in which a sack of corn figures (Gen. xliv). Baseball slang sense of "a base" is attested from 1913. Slang meaning "bunk, bed" is from 1825, originally nautical. The verb meaning "go to bed" is recorded from 1946. Sack race attested from 1805.
sack
n.2
"a dismissal from work," 1825, from sack (n.1), perhaps from the notion of the worker going off with his tools in a bag; the original formula was to give (someone) the sack. It is attested earlier in French (on luy a donné son sac, 17c.) and Dutch (iemand de zak geven).
sack
n.4
"sherry," 1530s, alteration of French vin sec "dry wine," from Latin siccus "dry" (see siccative).
sack
v.1
"to plunder," 1540s, from Middle French sac, in the phrase mettre à sac "put it in a bag," a military leader's command to his troops to plunder a city (parallel to Italian sacco, with the same range of meaning), from Vulgar Latin *saccare "to plunder," originally "to put plundered things into a sack," from Latin saccus "bag" (see sack (n.1)). The notion is probably of putting booty in a bag.
sack
n.3
"plunder; act of plundering, the plundering of a city or town after storming and capture," 1540s, from French sac "pillage, plunder," from Italian sacco (see sack (v.1)).
sack
v.2
"put in a bag," late 14c., from sack (n.1). Related: Sacked; sacking.
sack
v.3
"dismiss from work," 1841, from sack (n.2). Related: Sacked; sacking.
sack
Idioms and Phrases with sack out
sack out
Go to sleep, go to bed, as in We sacked out about midnight. This slangy idiom is a verbal use of the noun sack, slang for “bed” since about 1940; it alludes to a sleeping bag and appears in such similar phrases as in the sack, in bed, and sack time, bedtime.
sack
In addition to the idiom beginning with sack
- sack out
also see:
- get the ax (sack)
- hit the hay (sack)
- sad sack