Emily Dickinson Lexicon

LOCK, n. [Sax. loc or loce, an inclosed place, the fastening of a door, a tuft or curl of hair. In the latter sense, it is the G. locke, D. lok, L. floccus, Eng. lock; Ir. loc, a stop, hinder ante; W. lloc, a mound, an inclosed place; Russ. lokon, a lock of hair; Sax. lucan, Goth. lukan, to lock; Dan. lukke, a hedge, fence or bar; lukker, to shut, to inclose, to fasten, to lock; Fr. loquet, a latch; Arm. licqued, or clicqed, W. clicied. Lock and flock may be of one family. The primary sense is to shut, to close, to press, strain or drive, which may be the radical sense of flock, Gr. πλεκω, πλοκος, L. plico, as well as of lock. But see Class Lg, No. 48, and 13, 14, 16.]

1. Lock, in its primary sense, is any thing that fastens; but we now appropriate the word to an instrument composed of a spring, wards, and a bolt of iron or steel, used to fasten doors, chests and the like. The bolt is moved by a key.
2. The part of a musket or fowling-piece or other fire-arm, which contains the pan, trigger, &c.
3. The barrier or works of a canal, which confine the water, consisting of a dam, banks or walls, with two gates or pairs of gates, which may be opened or shut at pleasure.
4. A grapple or wrestling. – Milton.
5. Any inclosure. – Dryden.
6. A tuft of hair; a plexus of wool, hay or other like substance; a flock; a ringlet of hair. A lock of hair will draw more than a cable rope. – Grew. Lock of water, is the measure equal to the contents of the chamber of the locks by which the consumption of water on a canal is estimated.