wracks

Noun (1)

wrack (plural wracks)

1. The remains of something; a wreck.
   • Lytle was already moaning in shame, fallen back in bed with his hand across his face like he'd just washed up somewhere, a piece of wrack.2011, John Jeremiah Sullivan, “Mr. Lytle: An Essay”, in Pulphead
2. (UK, archaic, dialectal, literary) Vengeance; revenge; persecution; punishment; consequence; trouble.
   • The dead mans corps hath made ſome Serpents weépe, / Such rewth may ryſe in beaſts of bloudy race: / And yet can man (which bragges aboue the reſt) / Uſe wracke for rewth? can murder like him beſt?1575, Jacques du Fouilloux, “The Hare, to the Hunter”, in George Gascoigne, transl., The Noble Art of Venerie or Hunting. […], London: […] Thomas Purfoot, published 1611, →OCLC, page 177
3. (dialectal, archaic except UK) Ruin; destruction.
   • Therefore, in sign her treasure suffered wrack,
     Since Hero's time hath half the world been black.c. 1593, Christopher Marlowe, Hero and Leander, page 7

Noun (2)

wrack (countable and uncountable, plural wracks)

1. (archaic) Remnant from a shipwreck as washed ashore; flotsam or jetsam.
2. (archaic) The right to claim such items.
3. Any marine vegetation cast up on shore, especially seaweed of the family Fucaceae.

See all 11 meanings of wrack