Difference between to knock off and knock over (meaning to burgle and steal)
I recently watched a film in which two people were talking about houses that had been burgled. One of the characters said 'Two houses were knocked over last night. We need to find out who´s burgled them' I looked up in the dictionaries (Oxford and Macmillan) and the meaning of knocking over a place is to rob it and steal things. However, the same dictionaries say that to knock off also means to steal from a place, e.g.: They knocked off a bank.

I´d like to know if these phrasal verbs can be used interchangeably.

Thank you

Question

Difference between to knock off and knock over (meaning to burgle and steal)
I recently watched a film in which two people were talking about houses that had been burgled. One of the characters said 'Two houses were knocked over last night. We need to find out who´s burgled them' I looked up in the dictionaries (Oxford and Macmillan) and the meaning of knocking over a place is to rob it and steal things. However, the same dictionaries say that to knock off also means to steal from a place, e.g.: They knocked off a bank.

I´d like to know if these phrasal verbs can be used interchangeably.

Thank you

Answer

Hello Fabiano,

I believe that 'to knock over' is to rob a place and 'to knock off' is to steal something - there is also an adjective - 'knocked off' - which means stolen.

Best wishes

Bob

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