bike - Wiktionary, the free dictionary (original) (raw)

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

A bike.

Proto-Indo-European *kʷel-

Middle French

English bike

Clipping of bicycle. First attested in 1882.

One explanation for the form with /k/ is that bicycle was parsed to bi(cy)c(le). An alternative explanation is that it was parsed to bic(ycle) but since speakers are aware of a general /k/~/s/ alternation (as in electric ~ electricity etc.), the softened /s/ was restored to a default /k/ when the “ending” -ycle was dropped.[1] Similar cases are merc /mɜɹk/, spec /spɛk/ for mercenary, specify. It seems unlikely, however, that this process is purely phonological and not at least partially based on the spelling ⟨c⟩.

bike (plural bikes)

  1. Clipping of bicycle.
    • 2017, Chiz Dakin, Cycling in the Peak District […] , Cicerone Press Limited, →ISBN:
      It's called a gravel bike, and seems to combine the advantages of both road and mountain bikes – with a similar ability to lap up the miles on tarmac as a road bike, while still being very capable off-road.
    • 2025 December 11, Michelle Bandur, “Rocklin schools put the brakes on class 2 e-bikes due to more crashes, safety concerns”, in KCRA‎[1]:
      Some of the bikes parked outside Granite Oaks Middle School are the Class Two e-bikes the district is banning.
  2. Clipping of motorbike.
  3. Any vehicle sharing some characteristics with a bicycle or motorbike, such as pedal power, a handlebar, or a saddle.
    • 2017 July 17, Nell's Tavern, Larry Brasington, page 50:
      He warmed up the engine; the bike hovered off the ground despite his weight and the extra equipment.
    • 2021 May 18, Michael Hearst, Unconventional Vehicles: Forty-Five of the Strangest Cars, Trains, Planes, Submersibles, Dirigibles, and Rockets EVER, Chronicle Books, →ISBN, page 17:
      In 2017, Amsterdam banned beer bikes from the center of the Dutch city. About 6,000 locals signed a petition, calling on the council to outlaw the vehicles, referring to them as a “terrible phenomenon.”
  4. (slang, derogatory) Ellipsis of village bike.
    Synonyms: slapper, slag

bicycle

motorcycle

promiscuous woman

bike (third-person singular simple present bikes, present participle biking, simple past and past participle biked) (informal)

  1. (intransitive) To ride a bike.
    I biked so much yesterday that I'm very sore today.
    • 1975 April 17, Jack Weatherly, “Dallas or Bust”, in The Courier News, volume 80, number 286, Blytheville, Ark., page 8, column 3:
      In the 1890’s “women were behind the stove,” he relates. But they cycled, too. “And they had difficulty pedalling bicycles with ankle-length skirts. “At the time,” Taylor said, “the most sinful thing a woman could do was to show light between her legs. “The original culotte was designed by a LAW member’s wife. The churches (in the East) termed this bepantsed female activity of biking “sinful bicycling,” he noted.
  2. (intransitive) To travel by bike.
    It was such a nice day I decided to bike to the store, though it's far enough I usually take my car.
    • 2017, Gucci Mane, Neil Martinez-Belkin, The Autobiography of Gucci Mane, page 32:
      He saw me catch a trap and leave the house of a drug dealer. That's why he targeted me. He could have easily blown my ass off right then and there for lying, but for some reason he didn't. He just left. I biked back to my plug's spot and told him […]
  3. (transitive) To transport by bicycle.
    I biked them the letters.
    • 2020 September 1, Tom Lamont, “The butcher's shop that lasted 300 years (give or take)”, in The Guardian‎[2]:
      Frank, a teenager, arrived at his grandfather’s shop to begin work as a butcher’s boy. The job would be to bike parcels of meat around Dronfield and the surrounding countryside between the cities of Sheffield and Chesterfield, right on the county border of Derbyshire and Yorkshire.
  1. ^ An Etymological Brainteaser: The Shortening of Bicycle to Bike, Robert B. Hausmann, American Speech, Vol. 51, No. 3/4 (Autumn - Winter, 1976), pp. 272–274

From Middle English bike, byke (“a nest of wild bees or wasps; also, honeycomb”), of unknown origin. Perhaps a back-formation of Middle English *bykere (“beekeeper”), from Old English bēocere (“beekeeper”); or from Old English *bȳc, a byform of Old English būc (“belly; vessel; container”). Compare also Scots byke (“beehive, anthill; home, dwelling”), Old Norse bý (“bee”).

bike (plural bikes)

  1. (Scotland, Northern England) A hive of bees, or a nest of wasps, hornets, or ants.
    • 1955, Robin Jenkins, The Cone-Gatherers, Canongate, published 2012, page 107:
      he stood for a minute talking to them about their job of gathering cones, and telling them a story about a tree he’d once climbed which had a wasp’s byke in it unbeknown to him.
  2. (chiefly Scotland, by extension, collective) A crowd of people.

From Latin pix.

bike inan

  1. pitch

bike

  1. shake, move
    Mam yetɩ m yõkɛ la foote, zɛ sĩm da bike
    I'm going to take a photo, keep still, and do not move

bike

  1. inflection of biker:
    1. first/third-person singular present indicative/subjunctive
    2. second-person singular imperative

Borrowed from English bike.

bike f (invariable)

  1. motorbike, motorcycle

Borrowed from English bike.

bike f (plural bikes)

  1. (Jersey) bicycle

bike

  1. third-person singular future of kirin

Unadapted borrowing from English bike.

bike f (plural bikes)

  1. (Brazil, slang) bike (bicycle)
    Synonym: bicicleta

bike

  1. accusative plural of bik