Other forms: cheeks
Your cheeks are the two soft sides of your face that go red when you are embarrassed. Below the eyes, either side of the nose.
They are where a blush shows and where you kiss somebody in greeting. The word has a strong British second sense meaning impertinence, so having the cheek to ask is being brazen, and calling a child cheeky comes from the same place. English adds a few phrases: cheek by jowl means very close together, and turning the other cheek means refusing to retaliate.
The cheek is named for chewing. Old English ċēce meant cheek and jaw together, from a root that probably meant to chew.
Proto-Indo-European
*ǵyewh₁- — to chew
Proto-Germanic
*kēkǭ
Proto-West Germanic
*kākā
Old English
ċēce
Middle English
cheeke
English, today
cheek
Built from
From Middle English cheeke, cheke, cheoke, choke, from Old English ċēce, ċēace, ċēoce (“cheek; jaw”), from Proto-West Germanic kākā, keukā (“jaw, cheek”), from Proto-Germanic kēkǭ, keukǭ (“jaw; palate; pharynx”), perhaps from Proto-Indo-European ǵyewh₁- (“to chew”). Cognate with stq Sooke (“cheek”), West Frisian tsjeak (“jaw”), Dutch kaak (“jaw; cheek”), Swedish käke (“jaw; jowl”), Norwegian kjake (“jaw”), Old Norse kók (“mouth; gullet”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA