Oh my word aYoke, Yolk, Yak, Yokel

Yoke and yolk are pronounced in the same way – yok, but they have a different meaning. Yoke is a connecting bar; a wooden beam that is fastened over the necks of two animals and attached to the plough or cart that they are to pull. It’s a harness, a collar, a coupling. Yoke usually has oxbows and a crosspiece with or without a chain ring.

The horses were loosened from the yoke. Yoke is a part of a garment that fits over the shoulders and to which the main part of the garment is attached. The pinafore fell amply from a short yoke.Yoke is an object like a wooden shoulder-piece for carrying a pair of pails or baskets or containers.

Yoke as a verb refers to put together, coupled, or united, linking one thing to another. Verb forms of yoke are yokes, yoked, yoking. A plough drawn by a camel and donkey yoked together For freedom fighters it took almost two hundred years to get rid of the British colonial yoke in the Indian subcontinent.

Yolk is the yellow inner part of an egg (the white or liquid part is called albumen). Yolk is rich in proteins and fats. Yolk nourishes the developing embryo. Yolked, yolkless and yolky are adjectives. The chef asked me to separate an egg and season the yolk with grated long pepper.

‘Yak’ functions as noun and verb. Yak refers to a Tibetan ox: a large, stocky, shaggy-haired wild ox, Bos grunniens, of the Tibetan highlands, having long, curved horns: endangered. Yak in verb form refers to a trivial, to talk, especially uninterruptedly and idly; gab; chatter. The verb forms of yak are yakked, and yakking.

They've been yakking on the phone for over an hour. Yaks in the Tibetan Himalayas are yoked to use them in farming and transporting. Yokel is a rustic person, a country bumpkin; an uneducated and unsophisticated person from the countryside.