wail
See also: Wäil
English
Pronunciation
- enPR: wāl, IPA(key): /weɪl/
Audio (US) (file) - Rhymes: -eɪl
- Homophone: wale
- Homophone: whale (in accents with the wine-whine merger)
Etymology 1
c. 1300, Middle English weilen, waylen (“to sob, cry, wail”),[1] from Old Norse væla (“to wail”),[2] from væ, vei (“woe”),[3] from Proto-Germanic *wai (whence also Old English wā (“woe”) (English woe)), from Proto-Indo-European *wai.
The verb is first attested in the intransitive sense; the transitive sense developed in mid-14th c.. The noun came from the verb.
Verb
wail (third-person singular simple present wails, present participle wailing, simple past and past participle wailed)
- (intransitive) To cry out, as in sorrow or anguish.
- (intransitive) To weep, lament persistently or bitterly.
- (intransitive) To make a noise like mourning or crying.
- The wind wailed and the rain streamed down.
- (transitive) To lament; to bewail; to grieve over.
- to wail one's death
- (Can we find and add a quotation of Shakespeare to this entry?)
- (slang, music) To perform with great liveliness and force.
- 1999, Lewis A. Erenberg, Swingin' the Dream: Big Band Jazz and the Rebirth of American Culture, page 111:
- At Boston's Roseland, as "the Count's band was wailing," he grabbed Mamie, an avid dancer. The "band was screaming when she kicked off her shoes and got barefooted
- 2012, Robert Lewis Barrett, A Portrait of the First Born As a Child, page 377:
- The band was really wailing as we quickly made our dance moves in a most provocative manner.
- 2013, Joan Silber, Fools, →ISBN:
- We had a nondenominational wedding, with a bunch of great Sufi musicians really wailing, and my wildly enthusiastic mother in attendance.
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Translations
to cry out
to weep, lament
to make a sound like crying
- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout#Translations.
Noun
wail (plural wails)
- A prolonged cry, usually high-pitched, especially as of grief or anguish. [from 15th c.]
- She let out a loud, doleful wail.
- Any similar sound as of lamentation; a howl.
- The wail of snow-dark winter winds.
- A bird's wail in the night.
- A sound made by emergency vehicle sirens, contrasted with "yelp" which is higher-pitched and faster.
Translations
loud cry or shriek
a long drawn out howl
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Verb
wail (third-person singular simple present wails, present participle wailing, simple past and past participle wailed)
References
- wail in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
- wail in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
- wail at OneLook Dictionary Search
Asilulu
References
- James T. Collins, The Historical Relationships of the Languages of Central Maluku, Indonesia (1983), page 70
Cebuano
Etymology
Blend of wala (“not”) + ilhi (“known, recognized”)
Pronunciation
- (General Cebuano) IPA(key): /ˈwaˌil̪/
- Rhymes: -il̪
- Hyphenation: wa‧il
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