The Collaborative International Dictionary
Knock \Knock\ (n[o^]k), v. i. [imp. & p. p. Knocked (n[o^]kt); p. pr. & vb. n. Knocking.] [OE. knoken, AS. cnocian, cnucian; prob. of imitative origin; cf. Sw. knacka. Cf. Knack.]
To drive or be driven against something; to strike against something; to clash; as, one heavy body knocks against another.
--Bacon.-
To strike or beat with something hard or heavy; to rap; as, to knock with a club; to knock on the door.
For harbor at a thousand doors they knocked.
--Dryden.Seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.
--Matt. vii. 7. -
To practice evil speaking or fault-finding; to criticize habitually or captiously. [Slang, U. S.]
To knock about, to go about, taking knocks or rough usage; to wander about; to saunter. [Colloq.] ``Knocking about town.''
--W. Irving.To knock up, to fail of strength; to become wearied or worn out, as with labor; to give out. ``The horses were beginning to knock up under the fatigue of such severe service.''
--De Quincey.To knock off, to cease, as from work; to desist.
To knock under, to yield; to submit; to acknowledge one's self conquered; -- an expression probably borrowed from the practice of knocking under the table with the knuckles, when conquered. ``Colonel Esmond knocked under to his fate.''
--Thackeray.
Knock \Knock\ (n[o^]k), v. t.
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To strike with something hard or heavy; to move by striking; to drive (a thing) against something; as, to knock a ball with a bat; to knock the head against a post; to knock a lamp off the table.
When heroes knock their knotty heads together.
--Rowe. -
To strike for admittance; to rap upon, as a door.
Master, knock the door hard.
--Shak. To impress strongly or forcibly; to astonish; to move to admiration or applause. [Slang, Eng.]
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To criticise; to find fault with; to disparage. ``Don't knock it if you haven't tried it.'' To knock in the head, or To knock on the head, to stun or kill by a blow upon the head; hence, to put am end to; to defeat, as a scheme or project; to frustrate; to quash. [Colloq.] -- To knock off.
To force off by a blow or by beating.
To assign to a bidder at an auction, by a blow on the counter.
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To leave off (work, etc.). [Colloq.] -- To knock out, to force out by a blow or by blows; as, to knock out the brains. To knock up.
To arouse by knocking.
To beat or tire out; to fatigue till unable to do more; as, the men were entirely knocked up. [Colloq.] ``The day being exceedingly hot, the want of food had knocked up my followers.''
--Petherick.(Bookbinding) To make even at the edges, or to shape into book form, as printed sheets.
To make pregnant. Often used in passive, "she got knocked up". [vulgar]
Usage examples of "to knock off".
He takes a few deep breaths, then scratches his bug bites, around but not on the itchiest places, taking care not to knock off any scabs: blood poisoning is the last thing he needs.
My chair was backed up against the wall in the sheriff's office, and I was looking at the stars through the windows and feeling too lazy to go back to my magazine and wondering if I ought to knock off and hit the sack or keep on listening to Cameron curse real steady as he went over his columns of figures for the hundred twenty-seventh time.
A rook slid over the inside curve of the torus and back up to knock off a knight before the pieces slowed and were still.
Solomon would not disobey his parents and eat green apples,--not even when they were ripe enough to knock off with a stick, but he had such a longing for them, that he pined, and passed away.