bulk
/bʌlk/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
Northern England/bʊlk/
bulk noun: size, specifically, volume.
Noun
bulk (countable and uncountable, plural bulks)
- Size, specifically, volume.
- The Quantity of Matter is the measure of the same, arising from its density and bulk conjunctly.1729, I Newton, Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy, page 1
- “ Didn't Balbus say this morning that, if a body is immersed in liquid, it displaces as much liquid as is equal to its own bulk? ” said Hugh.1885, Lewis Carroll, “Knot IX”, in A Tangled Tale, page 58
- Any huge body or structure.
- The obese woman couldn't ease her bulk through the narrow passageway.
- The major part of something.
- In the case of such a contract, there must be an implied condition that the bulk shall correspond with the sample in quality1911, Encyclopædia Britannica, volume 24, «Sample», page 119
- There were many wooden chairs for the bulk of his visitors, and two wicker armchairs with red cloth cushions for superior people. From the packing-cases had emerged some Indian clubs,[…], and all these articles[…] made a scattered and untidy decoration that Mrs. Clough assiduously dusted and...1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC
- Dietary fibre.
- Unpackaged goods when transported in large volumes, e.g. coal, ore, or grain.
- A cargo or any items moved or communicated in the manner of cargo.
- Excess body mass, especially muscle.
- A period where one tries to gain muscle.
- A hypothetical higher-dimensional space within which our own four-dimensional universe may exist.
- The body.
- ...haunted the chocolate-houses, beat the watch, lay on bulks, and got claps;1704, [Jonathan Swift], “Section II”, in A Tale of a Tub. […], London: […] John Nutt, […], →OCLC
- Methought I had, and often did I strive
To yield the ghost, but still the envious flood
Stopped in my soul and would not let it forth
To find the empty, vast, and wand'ring air,
But smothered it within my panting bulk,
Who almost burst to belch it in the sea.c. 1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Richard the Third: […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...
Adjective
bulk (not comparable)
Verb
bulk (third-person singular simple present bulks, present participle bulking, simple past and past participle bulked)
- To appear or seem to be, as to bulk or extent.
- The fame of Warburton possibly bulked larger for the moment.1878, Leslie Stephen, Samuel Johnson
- Last, behold on Juss’s right hand, yon lord that bulks mighty as Hercules yet steppeth lightly as a heifer.1922, E[ric] R[ücker] Eddison, The Worm Ouroboros: A Romance, London: Jonathan Cape […], →OCLC, page 6
- To grow in size; to swell or expand.
- To gain body mass by means of diet, exercise, etc.
- To put or hold in bulk.
- To add bulk to; to bulk out.
- Some of the towne dwellers haue ſo large an opinion of their ſetled prouiſion, that if all her Maieſties fleet at once ſhould put into their bay, within twelue dayes warning with ſo much double beere, beefe, fiſh and bisket they would bulke them as they could wallow away with.1599, [Thomas] Nashe, Nashes Lenten Stuffe, […], London: […] [Thomas Judson and Valentine Simmes] for N[icholas] L[ing] and C[uthbert] B[urby] […], →OCLC, page 6
bulk meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali
bulk in Hindi
- bulk, size, stature, body
- डील ḍīl
- bulk, size
- आयतन āytan
bulk in Tamil
- திரள், பெரு, பேரளவு, மொத்தமாக, பெருமளவில், தொகை
bulk in Urdu
- ڈھیر, ڈیل, جسامت, کثرت, تھوک, ضخامت
bulk in Bengali
- বপু, স্তূপাকার হত্তয়া, ভারী হত্তয়া, জরুরি হত্তয়া
More languagesFewer languages
- bulk in Malayalam
- അളവ്, ഭൂരിഭാഗം
- bulk in Kannada
- ರಾಶಿ, ಸಗಟು, ಒಟ್ಟು, ದೊಡ್ಡ ಪ್ರಮಾಣದ
- bulk in Sinhala
- මහත mahata
- bulk in Nepali
- बल्किङ
- bulk in Tagalog
- bikil
Examples of bulk in a sentence
- By this process the body of the oyster acquires such a plumpness and rotundity, and its bulk and weight are so increased, as to materially increase its selling value.1887, W. O. Atwater, “The Chemistry of Oyster-Fattening”, in Popular Science Monthly, volume 32, number November, page 77:
- The cliff-dwellers had chipped and chipped away at this boulder till it rested its tremendous bulk upon a mere pin-point of its surface.1912 January, Zane Grey, chapter 8, in Riders of the Purple Sage […], New York, N.Y.; London: Harper & Brothers Publishers, →OCLC:
- There were many wooden chairs for the bulk of his visitors, and two wicker armchairs with red cloth cushions for superior people.1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
- the main bulk of a nut roast is generally some form of carbohydrate, intended to lighten the load.2011 December 15, Felicity Cloake, “How to cook the perfect nut roast”, in Guardian:
Forms of bulk
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | bulks |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | bulks |
| present participle | bulking |
| past participle | bulked |
| past | bulked |
Origin of bulk
From Middle English bulk, bolke (“a heap, cargo, hold; heap; bulge”), borrowed from Old Norse búlki (“the freight or the cargo of a ship”), from Proto-Germanic *bulkô (“beam, pile, heap”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰelǵ- (“beam, pile, prop”). Compare Icelandic búlkast (“to be bulky”), Swedish dialectal bulk (“a bunch”), Danish bulk (“bump, knob”). Conflated with Middle English bouk (“belly, trunk”).
Words formed from bulk
- barrel bulk
- break bulk
- break-bulk
- bulk-add
- bulkage
- bulk bill
- bulk billing
- bulk bin
- bulk box
- bulk cargo
- bulk carrier
- bulk data
- bulk defect
- bulk density
- bulk eraser
- bulkish
- bulk large
- bulklike
- bulk liquid
- bulk mining
- bulksome
- bulk supply
- bulk technology
- bulk-up
- bulk viscosity
- bulkwise
- clean bulk
- debulk
- dirty bulk
- microbulk
- ore-bulk-oil carrier
- outbulk
- overbulk
- permabulk
- pseudobulk
- semibulk
- bulken
Phrases with bulk
- bulk add
- bulk adds
- broke bulk
- bulk added
- breaks bulk
- broken bulk
- bulk adding
- bulk cargos
- bulk cargoes
- bulk erasers
- bulk liquids
- breaking bulk
5 more phrasesFewer phrases
Words that rhyme with bulk
Questions about bulk
- What does bulk mean?
- Bulk means size, specifically, volume.
- What is bulk in Hindi?
- Bulk in Hindi is डील (ḍīl), आयतन (āytan). See Bulk meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use bulk in a sentence?
- By this process the body of the oyster acquires such a plumpness and rotundity, and its bulk and weight are so increased, as to materially increase its selling value.
- What part of speech is bulk?
- Bulk can be a noun, an adjective or a verb.
- How do you pronounce bulk?
- Bulk is pronounced /bʌlk/.
- What is the plural of bulk?
- The plural of bulk is bulks.
Words near bulk in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: bulk (page history and authors); आयतन (Hindi) (page history and authors); bulk (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); bulk (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); bulk (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); bulk (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); bulk (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); මහත (Sinhala) (page history and authors); bulk (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-bulk.ogg.
Cite this entry: “bulk.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/bulk. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.