Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A dull or boring person.
  • noun Chiefly British A donkey.
  • noun Australian An old, broken-down horse.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • An obsolete form of muck.
  • noun The mesh of a net: hence applied to any wickerwork.
  • A Middle English form of much.
  • noun A donkey.
  • noun A stupid fellow; a dolt.
  • noun Theat., a variety performer who plays on several instruments.
  • noun A negro.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun A mesh of a net, or of anything resembling a net.
  • noun A stupid person; a dolt.
  • noun Cant A donkey.
  • noun United States A negro.
  • noun (Theat. Slang) A performer, as a minstrel, who plays on several instruments.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun colloquial, dialectal A donkey.
  • noun A mesh of a net, or of anything resembling a net.
  • noun A black person.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun British informal for donkey

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Origin unknown.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Unknown.

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Examples

  • Some presents were distributed amongst them, of which the most valuable, in their estimation, were empty wine-bottles, which they called moke, this word was however used by them for water also, so that it was doubtful whether the word meant the article itself or the vessel that contained it.

    Narrative of a Survey of the Intertropical and Western Coasts of Australia Performed between the years 1818 and 1822 — Volume 1 Phillip Parker King

  • Besides a warrant f'r a moke was the same as a letther iv inthroduction to th 'warden iv th' pinitinchry.

    Mr. Dooley's Philosophy Finley Peter Dunne 1901

  • It was a ragged, unkempt pony, pitifully poor and very footsore, at first sight, an absolute "moke"; but a second glance showed colossal round ribs, square hips, and a great length of rein, the rest hidden beneath a wealth of loose hair.

    Three Elephant Power and Other Stories 1902

  • [S] moke from urban firestorms in a regional war would rise into the upper troposphere due to pyroconvection ... and then might induce significant climactic anomalies on global scales.

    I'm an uncle! (first of many follow-ons) frankwu 2006

  • Suddenly some moke to the right sat on his horn, and stayed on it for several seconds.

    Mary, Mary Patterson, James, 1947- 2005

  • ‘I believe she thinks more of that old moke than me and the children all put together,’ says Joe Moreton.

    Robbery Under Arms 2004

  • Please don't let him hate me. moke swirled along the low ceiling of the Shawn Fan.

    Step into Chaos Shatner, William 1999

  • Some girls ore married as children to moke sure they will be virgins.

    Chapter 17 1997

  • He checked out a poor moke porter who wore a dazed, flat look, as if life had left hirm behind about thirty years ago.

    Cat & Mouse Patterson, James 1997

  • No one had bothered to put the canvas over the Mini-moke, to shield it from the sun.

    Smokescreen Francis, Dick 1972

  • Some of our readers may remember that Mokes were Jeep-like British cars first built in the 1960s.

    MOKE International returns to US with street-legal 50 mph open-top electric vehicle Micah Toll 2022

Comments

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  • "For there they were all turned into mokes with ears a yard long, for meddling with matters which they do not understand, as Lucius did in the story. And like him, mokes they must remain, till, by laws of development, the thistles develop into roses. Till then, they must comfort themselves with the thought that the longer their ears are, the thicker their hides; and so a good beating don't hurt them."

    _from Water Babies - Charles Kingsley, 1937

    January 31, 2008

  • Used to drive around London in a mini moke in the 60s.

    I think it's a mokeless zone now though.

    January 31, 2008