Word Confusion: Hawk versus Hock

Plural for the noun: hawks
Gerund: hawking

Third person present verb: hawks
Past tense or past participle: hawked
Present participle: hawking

Plural for the noun: hocks
Gerund: hocking

Third person present verb: hocks
Past tense or past participle: hocked
Present participle: hocking

[Ornithology: Family Accipitridae] Several genera, especially Accipiter, which includes the Cooper’s hawk and goshawk

• [North American] A bird of prey related to the buteos
• [Falconry] Any diurnal bird of prey used in falconry
• Any of several similar, unrelated birds, as the nighthawk

A person who advocates an aggressive or warlike policy, especially in foreign affairs

[Informal] A ruthless or rapacious person who preys on others

A plasterer’s square board with a handle underneath for carrying plaster or mortar ²

A noisy effort to clear the throat ³

[know a hawk from a handsaw] To be able to judge things ⁴

• Be discerning

Verb, intransitive:
To fly, or hunt on the wing, like a hawk ¹

To hunt with hawks

To carry wares about for sale

• Peddle

[Of a bird or dragonfly] Hunt on the wing for food

Clear the throat noisily ³

Verb, transitive:
Carry around and offer (goods) for sale, typically advertising them by shouting ¹

• To advertise or offer for sale

To spread rumors, news, etc.

• [hawk something up] Bring phlegm up from the throat ³

A corresponding joint in a fowl

A knuckle of meat, especially of pork or ham

A dry white wine from the German Rhineland ²

• [Not in technical usage] Any dry white wine

[North American] Variant spelling of hawk

The state of being deposited or held as security ³

• Pawn

The condition of owing

• Debt

Verb, transitive:
[Informal] Pawn ⁴

To disable by cutting the tendons of the hock ⁵

• To hamstring

All I’m sayin’ is that we’d better watch that one like a hawk.

When I tipped my head back, I saw the hawk buckle its wings and plummet behind the trees.

The main aim of the business is to breed and sell falcons and hawks.

Hawks have a reputation for being violent predators, but like any group, some are gentle and quiet.

Right now, the Democratic foreign policy hawks are calling for more troops — an impossibility.

Aw, man, that was some hawk!

The corporation is now run by a bunch of young hawks.

Load some stucco on a hawk and then onto your trowel.

For large jobs, a hawk is better than a mud pan.

Verb, intransitive:
We’re going to hawk this afternoon.

You hear everything: coughing, hawking up a loogey, vomiting.

Swifts hawked low over the water.

Verb, transitive:
She makes a good living, hawking soap on telly.

The street traders were hawking costume jewelry.

Young boys hawking phone cards and cigarettes circulate among the tables as regularly as the uniformed waiters.

Aw, man, who hawked that one?

If you wish, add the meat from the hock and season with salt and pepper.

Bring us some bottles of hock, man.

He thought to ply her with a glass of hock.

She was forced to put her good jewelry in hock.

After the loan was paid, he was finally out of hock.

I’m in hock up to my ears.

Verb, transitive:
The company is in hock to the banks.

Hock their horses!

We were hocked by a total lack of knowledge.

1. Old English hafoc, heafoc is of Germanic origin and related to the Dutch havik and the German Habicht.
2. Late Middle English and of unknown origin.
3. 1575–85, imitative.
4. From Shakespeare’s Hamlet, II:2:375. Handsaw is probably a corruption of dialect heronshaw meaning heron from the Old English hafoc, which is related to the Old Norse haukr, the Old Frisian havek, the Old High German habuh, and the Polish kobuz.

1. Late Middle English, as a variant of hough.
2. An abbreviation of the obsolete hockamore, an alteration of the German Hochheimer (Wein) meaning wine from Hochheim.
3. 1855–60, Americanism, in hock meaning in debt and in prison is from the Dutch hok meaning kennel, sty, pen, jail, hutch, and/or hovel.
4. 1878, from the noun.
5. 1375–1425. as a dialectal variant of hough, from the Middle English ho(u)gh, apparently a back formation from late Middle English hokschyn, etc., and from the Old English h&0macr;hsinu meaning hock, literally, heel, sinew.