skunk

[ skuhngk ]

/ skʌŋk /

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See synonyms for: skunk / skunked / skunking on Thesaurus.com

noun, plural skunks, (especially collectively) skunk.

a small North American mammal, Mephitis mephitis, of the weasel family, having a black coat with a white, V-shaped stripe on the back, and ejecting a fetid odor when alarmed or attacked.

any of several related or similar animals.Compare hog-nosed skunk, spotted skunk.

Informal. a thoroughly contemptible person.

U.S. Navy Slang. an unidentified ship or target.

verb (used with object)

Slang. to defeat thoroughly in a game, especially while keeping an opponent from scoring: The team skunked the favorites in the crucial game.

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Origin of skunk

1625–35, Americanism;< the Massachusett reflex of Proto-Algonquian *šeka·kwa (derivative of *šek- urinate + -a·kw fox, foxlike animal

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

How to use skunk in a sentence

The team with Football Team for a name will still have a skunk for an owner and a quarterback whose selfishness will remind some of us of ourselves on foolish days.
Don’t make what’s interesting important, Ron Rivera says. Easier said than done for Washington.|Thomas M. Boswell|December 27, 2020|Washington Post
Twain and his brother get drunk, get skunked, and end up—and one point—naked, with nothing but their own laughter.
Book Bag: Timothy Egan’s Five Favorite Travel Books|Timothy Egan|October 23, 2012|DAILY BEAST
The Consarvatiff undertook tew ketch his skunk alive, and the konsequents waz, he got—skunked.
Josh Billings, Hiz Sayings|Henry Wheeler Shaw
The boys of that regiment came back in good spirits saying, that they had "skunked them."
History of the Twelfth West Virginia Volunteer Infantry|William Hewitt

Everybody is tolerably well satisfied except the hook-and-ladder gang, which, as usual, is skunked again—never got a ladder out.
Homeburg Memories|George Helgesen Fitch
Last night that posse of mine that you 'skunked,' you know, halted at the cross roads till them sojers went by.
The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories|Bret Harte

British Dictionary definitions for skunk

skunk

/ (skʌŋk) /

noun plural skunks or skunk

any of various American musteline mammals of the subfamily Mephitinae, esp Mephitis mephitis (striped skunk), typically having a black and white coat and bushy tail: they eject an unpleasant-smelling fluid from the anal gland when attacked

informal a despicable person

slang a strain of cannabis smoked for its exceptionally powerful psychoactive properties

verb

(tr) US and Canadian slang to defeat overwhelmingly in a game

Word Origin for skunk

C17: from Algonquian; compare Abnaki segākw skunk

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

skunk

Origin of skunk

Words related to skunk

How to use skunk in a sentence

British Dictionary definitions for skunk

Word Origin for skunk