chalk

[ chawk ]

noun

1. a soft, white, powdery limestone consisting chiefly of fossil shells of foraminifers.
2. a prepared piece of chalk or chalklike substance for marking, as for writing on a blackboard.
3. a mark made with chalk.
4. a score or tally.
5. Sports Slang. the competitor considered most likely to win by the oddsmakers; favorite:

   If you don’t know anything about either team, just bet the chalk.

verb (used with object)

1. to mark or write with chalk.
2. to rub over or whiten with chalk.
3. to treat or mix with chalk:

   to chalk a billiard cue.

4. to make pale; blanch:

   Terror chalked her face.

verb (used without object)

1. (of paint) to powder from weathering.

adjective

1. of, made of, or drawn with chalk.

verb phrase

1. 1. to score or earn:

      They chalked up two runs in the first inning.

   2. to charge or ascribe to:

      It was a poor performance, but may be chalked up to lack of practice.

chalk

/ tʃɔːk /

noun

1. a soft fine-grained white sedimentary rock consisting of nearly pure calcium carbonate, containing minute fossil fragments of marine organisms, usually without a cementing material
2. a piece of chalk or a substance like chalk, often coloured, used for writing and drawing on a blackboard
3. a line, mark, etc made with chalk
4. billiards snooker a small cube of prepared chalk or similar substance for rubbing the tip of a cue
5. a score, tally, or record
6. as alike as chalk and cheese or as different as chalk and cheese informal.
   totally different in essentials
7. by a long chalk informal.
   by far
8. can't tell chalk from cheese or doesn't know chalk from cheese
   to be unable to judge or appreciate important differences
9. not by a long chalk informal.
   by no means; not possibly
10. modifier made of chalk

verb

1. to draw or mark (something) with chalk
2. tr to mark, rub, or whiten with or as if with chalk
3. intr (of paint) to become chalky; powder
4. tr to spread chalk on (land) as a fertilizer

chalk

/ chôk /

1. A soft, white, gray, or yellow limestone consisting mainly of calcium carbonate and formed primarily from the accumulation of fossil microorganisms such as foraminifera and calcareous algae. Chalk is used in making lime, cement, and fertilizers, and as a whitening pigment in ceramics, paints, and cosmetics. The chalk used in classrooms is usually artificial.

Derived Forms

• ˈchalky, adjective
• ˈchalkˌlike, adjective
• ˈchalkiness, noun

Other Words From

• chalk·like adjective
• un·chalked adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of chalk¹

First recorded before 900; Middle English chalk, schalk, calk, Old English cealc “plaster, cement”; cognate with Old Saxon calc, Dutch kalk, German Kalch, Kalk, from Latin calc- (stem of calx ) “lime, limestone, quicklime,” from Greek chálix “small stone, rubble, gravel, mortar”

Word History and Origins

Origin of chalk¹

Old English cealc, from Latin calx limestone, from Greek khalix pebble

Example Sentences

In a post on X, Camden Police said emergency services were called to Chalk Farm Underground station in the early hours of Monday where they found "a casualty on the tracks".

From BBC

Operation Chalk is examining claims of physical and sexual abuse at Kerelaw School between the 1970s and 2000s.

From BBC

It’s no Field of Dreams, this bumpy patch of sun-baked earth with faded chalk lines, no bleachers, not a blade of grass and a drooping line of wire separating the outfield from houses where scraggly canines lurk.

From Los Angeles Times

I saw Trevor around the gym for months — scattered tattoos and black tank top with a cute smudge of climbing chalk on their ears.

From Los Angeles Times

Chalk it up to one more bizarre twist in an election season full of hairpin turns.

From Los Angeles Times