Balks vs Backs - What's the difference?
balks | backs |
(balk)
ridge, an unplowed strip of land
* Fuller
beam, crossbeam
A hindrance or disappointment; a check.
* South
A sudden and obstinate stop; a failure.
(sports) deceptive motion; feint
# (baseball) an illegal motion by the pitcher, intended to deceive a runner
# (badminton) motion used to deceive an opponent during a serve
(archaic) To pass over or by.
To omit, miss, or overlook by chance.
(obsolete) To miss intentionally; to avoid; to shun; to refuse; to let go by; to shirk.
* Evelyn
* Bishop Hall
* Drayton
To stop, check, block.
To stop short and refuse to go on.
To refuse suddenly.
To disappoint; to frustrate; to foil; to baffle; to thwart.
* Byron
To engage in contradiction; to be in opposition.
* Spenser
To leave or make balks in.
To leave heaped up; to heap up in piles.
* Shakespeare
To indicate to fishermen, by shouts or signals from shore, the direction taken by the shoals of herring.
(Webster 1913)
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As a verb balks
is (balk).As a noun backs is
.balks
English
Verb
(head)balk
English
Etymology 1
From (etyl) balke, (etyl) balca, either from or influenced by (etyl) .Alternative forms
* baulkNoun
(en noun)- Bad ploughmen made balks of such ground.
- a balk to the confidence of the bold undertaker
Verb
(en verb)- By reason of the contagion then in London, we balked the nns.
- Sick he is, and keeps his bed, and balks his meat.
- Nor doth he any creature balk , / But lays on all he meeteth.
- The horse balked .
- to balk expectation
- They shall not balk my entrance.
- In strifeful terms with him to balk .
- (Gower)
- Ten thousand bold Scots, two and twenty knights, / Balk'd in their own blood did Sir Walter see.