aback

UK/əˈbæk/US/əˈbæk/

adverbB2+Rare in speech; mostly a word you read · #11,929 of 15,258neutral

Aback means backwards, and survives in the phrase taken by surprise. Taken aback, quite taken aback, she was taken aback.

Outside taken aback the word is dead. The origin is nautical: a sail is taken aback when the wind hits the wrong side and pushes it back against the mast, which stops the ship dead — exactly the effect the phrase describes. Note that it is a- plus back.

Definitions of aback

1adverbabackBackwards, in the phrase taken aback.B2+
“I was taken aback when my quiet neighbour suddenly started shouting at me.”

aback is a direction.

Where it comes from

Old English onbaec is on plus back. The sailing sense of a sail pressed back against the mast gave the modern phrase.

Old English
onbæc
Middle English
abak
English, today
aback

From Middle English abak, from Old English onbæc, equivalent to a + back. Compare West Frisian tebek (“aback”) literally “to/at back”, Swedish tillbaka idem..

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Song of Ice and Fire

Practise this word

aback in the wild

Critics were taken aback by its overt sexuality, since interpreted as anticipating Jungian ideas about the unconscious.
The Nightmare
Lawrence Tierney's performance as Alton Benes was praised by the cast and crew; however, they were taken aback by his disturbing behavior.
The Jacket (Seinfeld)
Grieve admitted to being taken aback by the storyline, but found it to be both challenging and rewarding.
Sam Kratz
The French community in Cochinchina was taken aback by the revolt that had occurred and demanded a strong response from the colonial authorities.
1916 Cochinchina uprising
The name "altazor" is a combination of the noun "altura" ("altitude") and the adjective "azorado" ("bewildered" or "taken aback").
Altazor

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

Related words

← Vocabulary