jack

• enPR: jăk, IPA^(key): /dʒæk/

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• Rhymes: -æk

From Middle English jakke (“a term of familiarity or contempt; guy; a mechanical turnspit; a brass coin”), from the name Jack. See Jack.

jack (plural jacks)

1. A mechanical device used to raise and (temporarily) support a heavy object, e.g. screw jack, scissor jack, hydraulic jack, ratchet jack, scaffold jack.

   She used a jack to lift her car and changed the tire.

2. A man or men in general.

   Every man jack.

3. A male animal.
4. A male ass.
5. (card games) A playing card with the letter "J" and the image of a knave or prince on it, the eleventh card in a given suit. Also called a knave.
6. (cricket, by extension) The eleventh batsman to come to the crease in an innings.
7. (archaic) A knave (a servant or later, a deceitful man).
   • 1799, THE SCOTS MAGAZINE OR GENERAL REPOSITORY OF LITERATURE, HISTORY, AND POLITICS‎, page 171:

     Fly may signify a winged insect, or part of a Jack. Jack itself is sometimes a roaster of meat, and at others a contraction of John, a knave, a Japan mug, or an instrument to draw off boots.

8. (sports) A target ball in bowls, etc; a jack-ball.
   • 1822, Walter Scott, Peveril of the Peak‎:

     like an uninstructed bowler, so to speak, who thinks to attain the jack, by delivering his bowl straight forward upon it

9. (games) A small, six-pointed playing piece used in the game of jacks.
10. (colloquial, euphemistic) Nothing, jack shit.

    You haven't done jack. Get up and get this room cleaned up right now!

11. (nautical) A small flag at the bow of a ship.
12. (nautical) A naval ensign flag flown from the main mast, mizzen mast, or the aft-most major mast of (especially) British sailing warships; Union Jack.
13. (military) A coarse and cheap medieval coat of defense, especially one made of leather.
    • 1786, Francis Grose, A Treatise on Ancient Armour and Weapons, page 15:

      The aketon, gambeson, vambasium, and jack were military vestments, calculated for the defence of the body, differing little from each other, except in their names, their materials and construction were nearly the same, the authorities quoted in the notes, shew they were all composed of many folds of linen, stuffed with cotton, wool or hair, quilted, and commonly covered with leather, made of buck or doe skin.

14. A penny with a head on both sides, used for cheating.[1]
15. (slang) Money.
    • 1939, Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep, Penguin 2011, page 133:

      First off Regan carried fifteen grand, packed it in his clothes all the time. Real money, they tell me. Not just a top card and a bunch of hay. That's a lot of jack [...].

16. (slang, Appalachians) A smooth often ovoid large gravel or small cobble in a natural water course.
17. Mangifera caesia, related to the mango tree.
18. The freshwater pike, green pike or pickerel.
19. A large California rockfish, the bocaccio, Sebastes paucispinis.
20. Any of the marine fish in the family Carangidae.

    Synonym: jack mackerel

21. (obsolete, nautical) A sailor, a jacktar.
22. (obsolete) A pitcher or can of waxed leather, supposed to resemble a jackboot; a black-jack.

    (Can we find and add a quotation of John Dryden to this entry?)

    • (Can we date this quote?) Charles Lamb, The Essays of Elia

      He had his tea and hot rolls in a morning, while we were battening upon our quarter-of-a-penny loaf — our crug — moistened with attenuated small beer, in wooden piggings, smacking of the pitched leathern jack it was poured from.

23. (Britain, dialectal, obsolete) A drinking measure holding half a pint or, sometimes, a quarter of a pint.

    (Can we find and add a quotation of Halliwell to this entry?)

24. A mechanical contrivance, an auxiliary machine, or a subordinate part of a machine.
    1. A device to pull off boots.
    2. A sawhorse or sawbuck.
    3. A machine for turning a spit; a smokejack.
    4. (mining) A wooden wedge for separating rocks rent by blasting.
    5. A lever for depressing the sinkers which push the loops down on the needles in a knitting machine.
    6. A grating to separate and guide the threads in a warping machine; a heck box.
    7. A machine for twisting the sliver as it leaves the carding machine.
    8. A compact, portable machine for planing metal.
    9. A machine for slicking or pebbling leather.
    10. A system of gearing driven by a horse power, for multiplying speed.
    11. A hood or other device placed over a chimney or vent pipe, to prevent a back draught.
    12. In the harpsichord, an intermediate piece communicating the action of the key to the quill; also called hopper.
    13. In hunting, the pan or frame holding the fuel of the torch used to attract game at night; also, the light itself.

        (Can we find and add a quotation of C. Hallock to this entry?)

    14. (nautical) A bar of iron athwart ships at a topgallant masthead, to support a royal mast, and give spread to the royal shrouds; also called jack crosstree.

        (Can we find and add a quotation of R. H. Dana, Jr to this entry?)

25. A surface-mounted connector for electrical, especially telecommunications, equipment.

    telephone jack

26. Female ended electrical connector (see Electrical connector)

    Synonym: socket

27. Electrical connector in a fixed position (see Gender of connectors and fasteners)

• (playing card): knave
• (male ass): jackass

• (female ended electrical connector): plug

jack (third-person singular simple present jacks, present participle jacking, simple past and past participle jacked)

1. (transitive) To use a jack.

   He jacked the car up so that he could replace the brake pads.

2. (transitive) To raise or increase.

   If you want to jack your stats you just write off failures as invalid results.

3. To produce by freeze distillation; to distil (an alcoholic beverage) by freezing it and removing the ice (which is water), leaving the alcohol (which remains liquid).
   • 1941, Esquire, volume 15, issues 1-3, page 176:

     Fruit of the orchard has been "jacked" these many generations, with Plymouth Rockers putting the hard cider barrel down into the ground to freeze, and […]

   • 2010, Scott Mansfield, Strong Waters: A Simple Guide to Making Beer, Wine, Cider ... →ISBN

     The potency of a jacked beverage depends on the temperature applied to the original beverage; the colder the liquor, the more water can be frozen out […] . In New England, where this technique was historically used, people could get applejack to around 30 percent alcohol […] .

4. (transitive, colloquial) To steal something, typically an automobile. Shortened form of carjacking.

   Someone jacked my car last night!

5. (intransitive) To dance by moving the torso forward and backward in a rippling motion.

• jack up (several meanings)
• jack off

jack (comparative more jack, superlative most jack)

1. (Australia) Tired, disillusioned; fed up (with). [from 19th c.]
   • 2006, Alexis Wright, Carpentaria, Giramondo 2012, p. 78:

     In the end, black and white were both crawling on the ground in reconciliation. Both saying that they were plain jack of each other.

This etymology is incomplete. You can help Wiktionary by elaborating on the origins of this term.

jack (plural jacks)

1. (slang, baseball) A home run.

jack (third-person singular simple present jacks, present participle jacking, simple past and past participle jacked)

1. (transitive, slang, baseball) To hit (the ball) hard; especially, to hit (the ball) out of the field, producing a home run.
   • 1986, in Arete: The Journal of Sport Literature, Volume 4, Sport Literature Association:

     An excellent piece of work, Wayne thought, so good in fact, he wasn’t surprised when Bailey walked to the plate and on the first pitch jacked the ball far into the parking lot outside the left-field fence for a tournament winning homerun.

   • 2004, Wayne Stewart, Hitting Secrets of the Pros: Big League Sluggers Reveal the Tricks of Their Trade, McGraw-Hill Professional, →ISBN, page 90:

     Therefore, even though Vizquel is certainly not a power hitter, at times he will try to jack the ball, perhaps pulling it with just enough oomph to carry down the line for a homer.

   • a. 2009, Jim McManus, quoted in T.J. Lewis, A View from the Mound: My Father’s Life in Baseball, Lulu.com (publisher, 2008), →ISBN, page 107:

     Maybe he hung a curve ball to somebody and they jacked it out of the park on him and he wasn’t upset about it.

French jaque, jacque, perhaps from the proper name Jacques. Compare jacquerie.

jack (plural jacks)

1. A coarse mediaeval coat of defence, especially one made of leather.
   • Sir J. Harrington

     Their horsemen are with jacks for most part clad.

jack (plural jacks)

1. A jackfruit tree.

• jack in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

Borrowed from English jack.

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jack n (plural jacks, diminutive jackje n)

1. jacket

Borrowed from English jack.

jack m (plural jacks)

1. jack (an electronic connector mounted on a surface)