Definition of "wrack"

wrack¹

/ɹæk/

noun
plural wracks
1. (archaic, dialectal or literary) Vengeance; revenge; persecution; punishment; consequence; trouble.
2. (archaic, except in dialects) Ruin; destruction.
  Quotations
  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
3. The remains; a wreck.
  Quotations
  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
verb
third-person singular simple present wracks, present participle wracking, simple past and past participle wracked
1. (UK dialectal, transitive) To execute vengeance; avenge.
2. (UK dialectal, transitive) To worry; tease; torment.

/ɹæk/

noun
countable and uncountable, plural wracks
1. (archaic) Remnant from a shipwreck as washed ashore, or the right to claim such items.
2. Any marine vegetation cast up on shore, especially seaweed of the family Fucaceae.
3. Weeds, vegetation or rubbish floating on a river or pond.
4. A high flying cloud; a rack.
  Quotations
  A dull wrack was drifting slowly across the sky, and a star or two twinkled dimly here and there through the rifts of the clouds.
  1892, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes‎, HTML edition, The Gutenberg Project, published 2011
verb
third-person singular simple present wracks, present participle wracking, simple past and past participle wracked or wrackt
1. (transitive, usually passive voice) To wreck, especially a ship.
2. Alternative form of rack (“to cause to suffer pain, etc.”)