tank

American  

[tangk] / tæŋk /

noun

1. a large receptacle, container, or structure for holding a liquid or gas.

   tanks for storing oil.

2. a natural or artificial pool, pond, or lake.

3. Military. an armored, self-propelled combat vehicle, armed with cannon and machine guns and moving on a caterpillar tread.

4. (in a video game) a category of job classes in a role-playing game, best suited to withstand large amounts of damage from an enemy.

   The only decent tank in this game is Warrior, just because the cooldown period for the Paladin and Dark Knight skills is way too long.

5. Slang. a prison cell or enclosure for more than one occupant, as for prisoners awaiting a hearing.

6. tank top.

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verb (used with object)

1. to put or store in a tank.

2. (in a video game) to provoke and hold the attention of (an enemy character) so that it does not target other player characters in the party who are less able to withstand large amounts of damage.

   If you’re properly tanking this boss, you’ll never let him face your mages.

verb (used without object)

1. Slang. to do poorly or decline rapidly; fail.

   The movie tanked at the box office.

verb phrase

1. tank up

   1. to fill the gas tank of an automobile or other motor vehicle.

   2. Slang. to drink a great quantity of alcoholic beverage, especially to intoxication.

idioms

1. go in / into the tank, to go through the motions of a match but deliberately lose because of an illicit prearrangement or fix; throw a fight.

2. in the tank,

   1. failing, doing poorly, or declining.

      His grades were in the tank last quarter.

   2. favoring, colluding, or assisting in a partisan way (often followed by with orfor ).

      The talk-show host was in the tank with the Green Party.

tank British  

/ tæŋk /

noun

1. a large container or reservoir for the storage of liquids or gases

   tanks for storing oil

2. 1. an armoured combat vehicle moving on tracks and armed with guns, etc, originally developed in World War I

   2. ( as modifier )

      a tank commander

      a tank brigade

3. dialect a reservoir, lake, or pond

4. photog

   1. a light-tight container inside which a film can be processed in daylight, the solutions and rinsing waters being poured in and out without light entering

   2. any large dish or container used for processing a number of strips or sheets of film

5. slang

   1. a jail

   2. a jail cell

6. Also called: tankful.  the quantity contained in a tank

7. a dam formed by excavation

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verb

1. (tr) to put or keep in a tank

2. (intr) to move like a tank, esp heavily and rapidly

3. slang to defeat heavily

4. informal (intr) to fail, esp commercially

tank More Idioms  

More idioms and phrases containing tank

• think tank

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Other Word Forms

• tankless adjective
• tanklike adjective

Etymology

Origin of tank

First recorded in 1610–20; perhaps jointly from Gujarati tānkh “reservoir, lake,” and Portuguese tanque, shortening of estanque “pond,” literally, “something dammed up,” derivative of estancar, from Vulgar Latin stanticāre (unattested) “to dam up, weaken”; adopted as a cover name for the military vehicle during the early stages of its manufacture in England (December 1915)

Example Sentences

His economics credentials—a Ph.D., stints on the staff of the Fed, at mainstream think tanks and publications in respected journals—are solid.

From The Wall Street Journal

“For the most part, they are exploiting known vulnerabilities,” said Ari Ben Am, an adjunct fellow at the Center on Cyber and Technology Innovation at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington think tank.

From The Wall Street Journal

The rebels marched on to the brink of Myanmar's second city, Mandalay, before Beijing pumped the brakes, said Morgan Michaels, a research fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies think tank.

From Barron's

A think tank is fundamentally a collection of people and donors who believe in certain ideas and principles.

From The Wall Street Journal

More remarkable is that the U.S. was again unprepared, without a tank on the peninsula when the North Koreans crossed the 38th parallel.

From The Wall Street Journal

Related Words

• pond
• pool
• reservoir