punch

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“
At last, when the punch was all gone, and the night nearly so, they sallied forth to see each other home.

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Definitions (59)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (18)

  1. noun A tool for circular or other piercing: a leather punch.
  2. noun A tool for forcing a pin, bolt, or rivet in or out of a hole.
  3. noun A tool for stamping a design on a surface.
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Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (28)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (7)

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Examples (50)

  • What you described as a punch was the sound of a fox's head being crushed, which is why Ailsa ac­cused him of insanity. —  Fox Evil
  • Within the body of the punch is a spring loaded spike.
  • By the time you succumb to peer pressure, the guests have all left but the punch is all gone too. —  Michael Gracie
  • The reason is that formerly only one artist, known as a punch-cutter, could work on a single face, and he had to cut all the sizes, otherwise there were noticeable differences in style. —  The Building of a Book A Series of Practical Articles Written by Experts in the Various Departments of Book Making and Distributing
  • Here is the steward's room and the beaufet: the steward is squeezing lemons for the punch, and there is the champagne in ice; and by the side of the pail the long-corks are ranged up, all ready. —  The Three Cutters
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Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms

Used in the same context Used in the Same Context

kick ·  brandy ·  cider ·  blow ·  jab ·  beer ·  slap ·  thrust ·  juice ·  champagne ·  slash ·  twist

Used in the same contextWord Family

punch:   punches ·  Punch ·  punched ·  punching
Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (9)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (3)

  1. Middle English pounce, punche, from Old French poinçon, ponchon; see puncheon1. V., from Middle English pouncen, punchen, to prick, from Old French poinçoner, ponchoner, to emboss with a punch; see punch2.
  2. Middle English punchen, to thrust, prod, prick, from Old French poinçonner, ponchonner, to emboss with a punch, from poinçon, ponchon, pointed tool; see puncheon1.
  3. Perhaps from Hindi pañc, five, from Sanskrit pañca (from its originally having been prepared from five ingredients); see penkwe in Indo-European roots.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (6)

  1. from Middle English punchen = Spanish punchar (from Middle Latin punctare), punzar = Portuguese punçar (from Middle Latin *punctiare, punctuare), pierce, prick, punch, sting, from Middle Latin punctuare, punctare, pierce, prick, punch, from Latin punctum, punctus, a point: see point, n. and v. The English form is in part due to the related noun puncheon (see puncheon), and has been in part confused with Middle English punchen, variant of punischen, punish (see punch), also with Middle English bunchen, beat, strike (see bunch).
  2. from punch, v.; in part prob. abbreviation of puncheon, q. v.
  3. from Middle English punchen, a syncopated form of punischen, punish (cf. similar syncopated Middle English forms of polish, vanish, and the reverse in Middle English perishen, variant of perchen, percen, pierce: see pierce). Punch in this sense has been confused with punch, with which it is now practically identified: see punch, and cf. bunch.
  4. from punch, v.
  5. Perhaps a variant of bunch; cf. punchy with bunchy.
  6. Formerly also pounche, punce (= Dutch pons = G. Swedish Danish punsch = French punch, ponche = Spanish Portuguese ponche = Italian punchio, ponchio, from English); so called from its five ingredients, from Hind, panch, five, from Sanskrit pancha, five, = English five: see five. The Hindustani punch does not seem to occur alone in the sense of ‘punch,’ but it is much used in composition to denote various mixtures of five things, as panchāmrit, a mixture of milk, curds, sugar, glue, and honey, panch-bhadra, a sauce of five ingredients, panch-pallav, a medical preparation from the sprouts of five trees, etc., or sets of five things, as panch-pir, five saints, panch-gavya, the five things yielded by the cow, etc.; also alone for an assembly of five men, or any council (cf. punchayet).
 

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/pəntʃ/
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