trunk

Plural: trunks

Noun

• The main woody stem of a tree; a large storage chest.
• the main stem of a tree; usually covered with bark; the bole is usually the part that is commercially useful for lumber
• luggage consisting of a large strong case used when traveling or for storage
• the body excluding the head and neck and limbs
• compartment in an automobile that carries luggage or shopping or tools
  • "he put his golf bag in the trunk"
• a long flexible snout as of an elephant
• Part of a body.
• The usually single, more or less upright part of a tree, between the roots and the branches.
• Part of a body.
• The torso; especially, the human torso.
• Part of a body.
• The conspicuously extended, mobile, nose-like organ of an animal such as a sengi, a tapir or especially an elephant. The trunks of various kinds of animals might be adapted to probing and sniffing, as in the sengis, or be partly prehensile, as in the tapir, or be a versatile prehensile organ for manipulation, feeding, drinking and fighting as in the elephant.
• A container.
• A large suitcase, chest, or similar receptacle for carrying or storing personal possessions, usually with a hinged, often domed lid, and handles at each end, so that generally it takes two persons to carry a full trunk.
• A container.
• A box or chest usually covered with leather, metal, or cloth, or sometimes made of leather, hide, or metal, for holding or transporting clothes or other goods.
• A container.
• The luggage storage compartment of a sedan/saloon-style car.
• A container.
• A storage compartment fitted behind the seat of a motorcycle.
• A channel for flow of some kind.
• A major circuit between telephone switchboards or other switching equipment.
• A channel for flow of some kind.
• A chute or conduit, or a watertight shaft connecting two or more decks.
• A channel for flow of some kind.
• A long, large box, pipe, or conductor, made of plank or metal plates, for various uses, as for conveying air to a mine or to a furnace, water to a mill, grain to an elevator, etc.
• A channel for flow of some kind.
• A long tube through which pellets of clay, peas, etc., are driven by the force of the breath. A peashooter
• A channel for flow of some kind.
• A flume or sluice in which ores are separated from the slimes in which they are contained.
• In software projects under source control: the most current source tree, from which the latest unstable builds (so-called "trunk builds") are compiled.
• The main line or body of anything.
• The main line or body of anything.
• A main line in a river, canal, railroad, or highway system.
• The main line or body of anything.
• The part of a pilaster between the base and capital, corresponding to the shaft of a column.
• A large pipe forming the piston rod of a steam engine, of sufficient diameter to allow one end of the connecting rod to be attached to the crank, and the other end to pass within the pipe directly to the piston, thus making the engine more compact.
• Ellipsis of swimming trunks.

Verb

• To lop off; to curtail; to truncate.
• To extract (ores) from the slimes in which they are contained, by means of a trunk.
• To provide simultaneous network access to multiple clients by sharing a set of circuits, carriers, channels, or frequencies.

Examples

• His Words With Friends strategy was built around finding the ’trunk’ words from which others could grow.
• the trunk of a vein or of an artery, as distinct from the branches

Synonyms

automobile trunk, body, bole, luggage compartment, proboscis, torso, tree trunk, bole#Etymology_1, boot, dicky, topbox, topcase

Related Words

TRUNKED