trunk

plural trunks

1. Part of a body.
   1. biologyThe usually single, more or less upright part of a tree, between the roots and the branches.

      Synonyms: bole, tree trunk, stock

   2. biologyThe torso; especially, the human torso.
   3. biologyThe 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.

      Synonyms: proboscis

2. A container.
   1. headingA 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.

      There is an hour or two, after the passengers have embarked, which is disquieting and fussy. Mail bags, so I understand, are being put on board. Stewards, carrying cabin trunks, swarm in the corridors.

      1915, G[eorge] A. Birmingham [pseudonym; James Owen Hannay], chapter I, in Gossamer, New York, N.Y.: George H. Doran Company, →OCLC, page 01

   2. headingA 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.

      To lie, like pawns, lock'd up in chests and trunks

      c. 1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life and Death of King Iohn”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i]

   3. CanadaUSautomotiveThe luggage storage compartment of a sedan/saloon-style car.

      I'm a stunt; ride in the car with some bump in the trunk.

      2005, “Stay Fly”, in Jordan Houston, Darnell Carlton, Paul Beauregard, Premro Smith, Marlon Goodwin, David Brown, Willie Hutchinson (lyrics), Most Known Unknown, performed by Three 6 Mafia (featuring Young Buck, 8 Ball, and MJG), Sony BMG

      Synonyms: boot, dicky

   4. automotiveA storage compartment fitted behind the seat of a motorcycle.

      Synonyms: topbox, topcase

3. A channel for flow of some kind.
   1. UScommunicationsA major circuit between telephone switchboards or other switching equipment.
   2. headingA chute or conduit, or a watertight shaft connecting two or more decks.
   3. headingA 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.
   4. archaicheadingA long tube through which pellets of clay, peas, etc., are driven by the force of the breath. A peashooter

      He shot Sugar Plums at them out of a Trunk.

      1655, James Howell, “To the Lord Viscount Col. from Madrid”, in Epistolæ Ho-Elianæ. Familiar Letters Domestic and Forren. […], 3rd edition, volume (please specify the page), London: […] Humphrey Mos[e]ley, […], →OCLC

   5. businessA flume or sluice in which ores are separated from the slimes in which they are contained.
4. computingIn software projects under source control: the most current source tree, from which the latest unstable builds (so-called "trunk builds") are compiled.
5. The main line or body of anything.

   the trunk of a vein or of an artery, as distinct from the branches

   1. transportA main line in a river, canal, railroad, or highway system.
   2. architectureThe part of a pilaster between the base and capital, corresponding to the shaft of a column.
6. 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.
7. abbreviationellipsisin pluralEllipsis of swimming trunks.

present singular third person trunks · participle present trunking · participle past trunked · past trunked

1. obsoletetransitiveTo lop off; to curtail; to truncate.

   Large streames of bloud out of the truncked stocke / Forth gushed, like fresh water streame from riuen rocke.

   1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto VIII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 10

2. transitivebusinessTo extract (ores) from the slimes in which they are contained, by means of a trunk.
3. communicationsTo provide simultaneous network access to multiple clients by sharing a set of circuits, carriers, channels, or frequencies.

plural Trunks

1. A surname from German.