wreck Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. noun something or someone that has suffered ruin or dilapidation
    • the house was a wreck when they bought it
    • thanks to that quack I am a human wreck
  2. noun an accident that destroys a ship at sea
    shipwreck.
  3. noun a serious accident (usually involving one or more vehicles)
    crash.
    • they are still investigating the crash of the TWA plane
  4. noun a ship that has been destroyed at sea
  5. verb smash or break forcefully
    wrack; bust up.
    • The kid busted up the car

WordNet

Wreck transitive verb & noun
Definitions
  1. See 2d & 3d Wreak.
Wreck noun
Etymology
OE. wrak, AS. wræc exile, persecution, misery, from wrecan to drive out, punish; akin to D. wrak, adj., damaged, brittle, n., a wreck, wraken to reject, throw off, Icel. rek a thing drifted ashore, Sw. vrak refuse, a wreck, Dan. vrag. See Wreak, v. t., and cf. Wrack a marine plant.
Definitions
  1. The destruction or injury of a vessel by being cast on shore, or on rocks, or by being disabled or sunk by the force of winds or waves; shipwreck.
    Hard and obstinate As is a rock amidst the raging floods, 'Gainst which a ship, of succor desolate, Doth suffer wreck, both of herself and goods. Spenser.
  2. Destruction or injury of anything, especially by violence; ruin; as, the wreck of a railroad train.
    The wreck of matter and the crush of worlds. Addison.
    Its intellectual life was thus able to go on amidst the wreck of its political life. J. R. Green.
  3. The ruins of a ship stranded; a ship dashed against rocks or land, and broken, or otherwise rendered useless, by violence and fracture; as, they burned the wreck.
  4. The remain of anything ruined or fatally injured.
    To the fair haven of my native home, The wreck of what I was, fatigued I come. Cowper.
  5. (Law) Goods, etc., which, after a shipwreck, are cast upon the land by the sea. Bouvier.
Wreck transitive verb
Wordforms
imperfect & past participle Wrecked ; present participle & verbal noun Wrecking
Definitions
  1. To destroy, disable, or seriously damage, as a vessel, by driving it against the shore or on rocks, by causing it to become unseaworthy, to founder, or the like; to shipwreck.
    Supposing that they saw the king's ship wrecked. Shak.
  2. To bring wreck or ruin upon by any kind of violence; to destroy, as a railroad train.
  3. To involve in a wreck; hence, to cause to suffer ruin; to balk of success, and bring disaster on.
    Weak and envied, if they should conspire, They wreck themselves. Daniel.
Wreck intransitive verb
Definitions
  1. To suffer wreck or ruin. Milton.
  2. To work upon a wreck, as in saving property or lives, or in plundering.

Webster 1913