The noun is from Middle English smac, smak, smacke, from Old English smæc, smæċċ (“taste, smatch”), from Proto-West Germanic *smakku, from Proto-Germanic *smakkuz (“a taste”), from Proto-Indo-European *smegʰ-, *smeg- (“to taste”). The verb is from Middle English smaken. Doublet of smatch (obsolete, “taste”; q.v.), from Old English smæċċan (“to taste, smack”).
Cognate with Scots smak (“scent, smell, taste, flavour”), Saterland Frisian Smoak (“taste”), West Frisian smaak (“taste”), Dutch smaak (“taste”), German Schmack, Geschmack (“taste”), Danish smag (“taste”), Swedish and Norwegian smak (“taste”), Norwegian smekke.
Meanings
(countable, uncountable) A distinct flavor, especially if slight.
rice pudding with a smack of cinnamon
But take it: if the smack is sour / The better for the embittered hour; […] 1896, A[lfred] E[dward] Housman, “(please specify the poem number)”, in A Shropshire Lad, London: The Richards Press, →OCLC:
I did not call him fool, and vex my friend, / But quietly allowed experiment, / Encouraged him to dust his drink, and now / Grate lignum vitæ now bruise so-called grains / Of Paradise, and now, for perfume, pour / Distilment rare, the rose of Jericho, / Holy-thorn, passion-flower, and what know I? / Till beverage obtained the fancied smack. 1873 January 23, Robert Browning, “Part IV”, in Red Cotton Night-Cap Country: Or Turf and Towers, London: Smith, Elder, & Co., […], →OCLC, page 245:
(countable, uncountable) A slight trace of something; a smattering.
He was not sailorly, and yet he had a smack of the sea about him too. 1881–1882, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, London; Paris: Cassell & Company, published 14 November 1883, →OCLC:
I like my cousins in Holland immensely, but I feel more sib to the Northerners. Your description of Lofoten is fine. I can see them. They must be enchanting in their way, cod's head and tails or no. There is a fine eau de Javelle smack about a Dutch canal, by the way, that takes[…] 1906, Oliver Elton, Frederick York Powell: A Life and a Selection from His Letters and Occasional Writings, page 249:
(slang, uncountable) Synonym of heroin.
Claude overdosed on smack in a Chicago flophouse three years later. 2019, Colson Whitehead, The Nickel Boys, Fleet, page 191:
(Northern-England, countable, uncountable) A form of fried potato; a scallop.
The noun is from Middle English smac, smak, smacke, from Old English smæc, smæċċ (“taste, smatch”), from Proto-West Germanic *smakku, from Proto-Germanic *smakkuz (“a taste”), from Proto-Indo-European *smegʰ-, *smeg- (“to taste”). The verb is from Middle English smaken. Doublet of smatch (obsolete, “taste”; q.v.), from Old English smæċċan (“to taste, smack”).
Cognate with Scots smak (“scent, smell, taste, flavour”), Saterland Frisian Smoak (“taste”), West Frisian smaak (“taste”), Dutch smaak (“taste”), German Schmack, Geschmack (“taste”), Danish smag (“taste”), Swedish and Norwegian smak (“taste”), Norwegian smekke.
Meanings
(transitive) To get the flavor of.
He soon smacked the taste of physic hidden in this sweetness. 1827, Thomas Carlyle (translator), Johann August Musæus, "Melechsala" (1782-86); in German Romance I. 175
(intransitive) To have a particular taste; used with of.
1820-25, Charles Lamb, 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.
(intransitive) To indicate or suggest something; used with of.
Her reckless behavior smacks of pride.
All sects, all ages, smack of this vice. c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Measure for Measure”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene ii]:
From Middle Low German smack (Low German Schmacke, Schmaake (“small ship”)) or Dutch smak, perhaps ultimately related to smakken, imitative of the sails' noise.
Meanings
A small sailing vessel, commonly rigged as a sloop, used chiefly in the coasting and fishing trade and often called a fishing smack.
He had sung when he was by himself in the old days and he had sung at night sometimes when he was alone steering on his watch in the smacks or in the turtle boats. 1952 September 1, Ernest Hemingway, The Old Man and the Sea, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons, →OCLC, page 39:
But without Union reinforcement, as many men as could be packed into a mere fishing smack could take the fort, Meigs wrote to Washington. 2009, Simon Schama, The American Future: A History:
(collective) A group of jellyfish.
In November 2007, a 16-square-kilometer smack of jellyfish at a depth of 35 feet invaded the Northern Salmon Company, Northern Ireland's only salmon farm, killing more than 100,000 fish at a cost of more than $2 million. 2017, Bruce E. Johansen, Climate Change: An Encyclopedia of Science, Society, and Solutions, Bloomsbury Publishing:
Smacks of jellyfish are like genderless gangs. 2017, Heather Davis, editor, Desire Change: Contemporary Feminist Art in Canada, McGill-Queen's University Press, page 61:
As we paddled we passed a smack of jellyfish 2008, Sean Stanley, Etcetera and Otherwise, Tightrope Books, page 55:
fi smakki (sailing vessel) · de Schmack (sailing vessel) · uk присма́чити (to get flavour) · es sumaca (sailing vessel) · bg гемия (sailing vessel) · it semalo (sailing vessel)
From Middle English *smakken, from Middle Dutch smacken (modern Dutch smakken (“to smack, pop, hurl down, crash”)), from Old Dutch *smakkon, from Proto-West Germanic *smak(k)ōn, ultimately of imitative origin.
Cognate West Frisian smakke, Middle Low German smacken (“to hit, hurl, fling”), Plautdietsch schmaksen (“to smack the lips”), German schmatzen (“eat noisily”), regional German schmacken, Schmackes (“vigour”) (compare Swedish smak (“slap”), the first part of Saterland Frisian smakmuulje (“to smack, slap”)).
Meanings
(not-comparable) As if with a smack or slap; smartly; sharply.
She fell smack on her face.
Right smack in the middle of getting ready to leave.
After one early moment in their courtship, Franny expresses, "That night I could feel my beauty standing up inside me for the first time in my life." These heightened scenes of discovery are offered smack amidst moods of vicious aggression and unresolvable separation, keeping Unusual Company rich with subtle twists. 1987 December 13, Elizaeth Pincus, “Gritty Love”, in Gay Community News, volume 15, number 22, page 9:
From Middle English *smakken, from Middle Dutch smacken (modern Dutch smakken (“to smack, pop, hurl down, crash”)), from Old Dutch *smakkon, from Proto-West Germanic *smak(k)ōn, ultimately of imitative origin.
Cognate West Frisian smakke, Middle Low German smacken (“to hit, hurl, fling”), Plautdietsch schmaksen (“to smack the lips”), German schmatzen (“eat noisily”), regional German schmacken, Schmackes (“vigour”) (compare Swedish smak (“slap”), the first part of Saterland Frisian smakmuulje (“to smack, slap”)).
Meanings
A sharp blow; a slap. See also: spank.
The sound of a loud kiss.
Then he told them of the princess, how she came to him, and how much she had to kiss him to get the whistle, when nobody saw or heard it over in the wood - "I must get on with these lies if the vat is to be full," said Ashiepattle, - so he told them about the queen, how stingy she was with the money and how liberal she was with kisses, that one could hear the smacks all over the wood. 1886, Peter Christen Asbjørnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 178:
he took the bride about the neck. And kissed her lips with such a clamorous smack. c. 1590–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Taming of the Shrew”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene ii]:
A quick, sharp noise, as of the lips when suddenly separated, or of a whip.
From Middle English *smakken, from Middle Dutch smacken (modern Dutch smakken (“to smack, pop, hurl down, crash”)), from Old Dutch *smakkon, from Proto-West Germanic *smak(k)ōn, ultimately of imitative origin.
Cognate West Frisian smakke, Middle Low German smacken (“to hit, hurl, fling”), Plautdietsch schmaksen (“to smack the lips”), German schmatzen (“eat noisily”), regional German schmacken, Schmackes (“vigour”) (compare Swedish smak (“slap”), the first part of Saterland Frisian smakmuulje (“to smack, slap”)).
Meanings
To slap or hit someone.
To make a smacking sound.
A horse neighed, and a whip smacked, there was a whistle, and the sound of a cart wheel. 1832, Benjamin Disraeli, Contarini Fleming:
(qualifier:especially outside of North America) To strike a child (usually on the buttocks) as a form of discipline. (normal U.S. and Canadian term spank)
To wetly separate the lips, making a noise, after tasting something or in expectation of a treat.
But when, obedient to the mode / Of panegyric, courtly ode / The bard bestrides, his annual hack, / In vain I taste, and sip and smack, / I find no flavour of the Sack. 1763, Robert Lloyd, “A Familiar Epistle”, in St. James Magazine:
To kiss with a close compression of the lips, so as to make a sound when they separate.
ru чмокнуть (to kiss with a sound) · pl plasnąć (to slap someone) · fi maiskuttaa (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · bg мляскам (to kiss with a sound) · ab аҿа́ҩра (to slap someone) · bg шляпвам (to slap someone) · fi muiskauttaa (to kiss with a sound) · es cachetear (to slap someone) · sk plesknúť (to slap someone) · fi läpsäyttää (to slap someone) · uk ля́снути (to slap someone) · uk цмо́кнути (to kiss with a sound) · mi kotekote (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · ru шлёпнуть (to slap someone) · es bofetear (to slap someone) · pl cmokać (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · pl cmoknąć (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · mi whakapokara (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · nrf bailli eune paffe (to slap someone) · fi läiskäyttää (to slap someone) · mi kamikami (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · bg мляскам (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · mi kōtamutamu (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · es sopapear (to slap someone) · nrf env'yer eune cliaque (to slap someone) · it schiaffeggiare (to slap someone) · eo frapi (to slap someone) · hts minca (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · uk чмо́кнути (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · es chasquear los labios (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · ru чмо́кать (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · ru чмо́кнуть (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · es lapear (to slap someone) · pl klapnąć (to slap someone) · hi थप्पड़ मारना (to slap someone) · ru шлёпать (to slap someone) · mi pākorakora (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · bg пляскам (to slap someone) · es abofetear (to slap someone) · pl dawać klapsa (to slap someone) · fi mässyttää (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · ru причмо́кнуть (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · mi papaki (to slap someone) · ru причмо́кивать (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · mi kōtamu (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · kix húa (to slap someone) · pl cmoknąć (to kiss with a sound) · mi pakara (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · uk чпо́кнути (to kiss with a sound) · hu cuppant (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · sk cmuknúť (to wetly separate the lips making a noise) · bg целувам шумно (to kiss with a sound) · fi mäiskäyttää (to slap someone) · pl cmokać (to kiss with a sound) · sk cmuknúť (to kiss with a sound)