Rack

Definition of rack:

part of speech: noun

An instrument for racking or extending: an engine for stretching the body in order to extort a confession: a framework on which articles are arranged: the grating above a manger for hay: ( mech.) a straight bar with teeth to work with those of a wheel: ( fig.) extreme pain, anxiety, or doubt.

part of speech: verb

To stretch forcibly: to strain: to stretch on the rack or wheel: to torture: to exhaust.

part of speech: noun

An engine of torture; frame work on which things are laid; grating to hold hay; toothed bar; flying clouds.

part of speech: noun

Thin or broken clouds, drifting across the sky.

part of speech: verb

To go at a pacing gait, as a horse.

part of speech: verb

To strain; torture; draw off, as liquor.

part of speech: noun

A distaff.

part of speech: verb

To stretch or strain on an instrument of torture; torture; torment; as, racked by remorse; strain; tear; as, racked by a cough; tax greatly; as, to rack one's brain.

part of speech: noun

An instrument for torturing the body by stretching or straining the limbs; formerly used to force a confession; intense physical or mental suffering; a framework on or in which articles are hung or arranged; a straight bar having teeth which work with the teeth of a pinion or cogwheel; thin, broken, vapory clouds; wreck; used only in rack and ruin; a pacing gait of a horse.

part of speech: verb

To strain or draw off from the lees, as wine.

Usage examples for rack:

• No, take pains and rack your brains! "Master and Man", Leo Tolstoy.

• You got a glimpse of a rack of rifles, of shadowy figures that made way for you, and of your captain speaking in a whisper. "With the French in France and Salonika", Richard Harding Davis.

• One man is stretched on the rack during twelve hours; another sleeps soundly in his bed: the difference of time perceived by these two persons is immense; one hardly will believe that half an hour has elapsed, the other could credit that centuries had flown during his agony. "The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume III", Percy Bysshe Shelley Edited by Thomas Hutchinson, M. A..

• He hung the towel on a rack reached out a hand. "Combat", Dallas McCord Reynolds.