hiss

From Middle English hissen, probably of onomatopoeic origin. Compare Middle Dutch hissen, hisschen (“to chase away, shoo”), Middle Low German hissen (“to chase, hound, incite”).

• IPA^(key): /hɪs/

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• Rhymes: -ɪs

hiss (plural hisses)

1. A sibilant sound, such as that made by a snake or escaping steam; an unvoiced fricative.
   • 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene ii]:

     Their music frightful as the serpent’s hiss,
     And boding screech-owls make the concert full!

   • 1667, John Milton, “Book VI”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC, lines 212-213:

     […] over head the dismal hiss
     Of fiery Darts in flaming volies flew,

   • 1717, John Dryden [et al.], “Book 13. [The Story of Acis, Polyphemus and Galatea.]”, in Ovid’s Metamorphoses in Fifteen Books. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:

     A hundred Reeds, of a prodigious Growth,
     Scarce made a Pipe, proportion’d to his Mouth:
     Which, when he gave it Wind, the Rocks around,
     And watry Plains, the dreadful Hiss resound.

   • 1874, Thomas Hardy, “Blame—Fury”, in Far from the Madding Crowd. […], volume II, London: Smith, Elder & Co., […], →OCLC, page 13:

     […] his form was soon covered over by the twilight as his footsteps mixed in with the low hiss of the leafy trees.

   • 1951, William Styron, chapter 6, in Lie Down in Darkness‎, New York: Vintage, published 1992, page 292:

     Her voice was a hiss, like gas escaping from a bottle of soda.

2. An expression of disapproval made using such a sound.
   • 1563 March 30 (Gregorian calendar), John Foxe, Actes and Monuments of These Latter and Perillous Dayes, […], London: […] Iohn Day, […], →OCLC, book V, Part 2, The Oration of Byshop Brookes in closing vp this examination agaynst Doctour Cranmer Archbishop of Caunterbury,, page [1878]:

     […] in open disputations ye haue bene openly conuict, ye haue bene openly driuen out of the schole with hisses […]

   • 1716, Joseph Addison, The Free-Holder, 16 April, 1716, London: D. Midwinter and J. Tonson, pp. 203-204,

     The Actors, in the midst of an innocent old Play, are often startled with unexpected Claps or Hisses; and do not know whether they have been talking like good Subjects, or have spoken Treason.

   • 1869, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter XXIX, in The Innocents Abroad, or The New Pilgrims’ Progress; […], Hartford, Conn.: American Publishing Company. […], →OCLC:

     Once or twice she was encored five and six times in succession, and received with hisses when she appeared, and discharged with hisses and laughter when she had finished—then instantly encored and insulted again!

hiss (third-person singular simple present hisses, present participle hissing, simple past and past participle hissed)

1. (intransitive) To make a hissing sound.

   As I started to poke it, the snake hissed at me.

   • 1567, Ovid, “The Twelfth Booke”, in Arthur Golding, transl., The XV. Bookes of P. Ouidius Naso, Entytuled Metamorphosis, […], London: […] Willyam Seres […], →OCLC, folio 152, recto:

     And in his wound the seared blood did make a gréeuous sound,
     As when a peece of stéele red who tane vp with tongs is drownd
     In water by the smith, it spirts and hisseth in the trowgh.

   • 1797, Ann Ward Radcliffe, chapter 7, in The Italian, volume II, London: T. Cadell Jun. & W. Davies, page 236:

     The man came back, and said something in a lower voice, to which the other replied, “she sleeps,” or Ellena was deceived by the hissing consonants of some other words.

   • 1995, Rohinton Mistry, chapter 10, in A Fine Balance‎, Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, page 487:

     The frying pan hissed and sizzled as Ishvar gently slid ping-pong sized balls into the glistening oil.

2. (transitive) To call someone by hissing.
   • 1961 November 10, Joseph Heller, “The Soldier in White”, in Catch-22 […], New York, N.Y.: Simon and Schuster, →OCLC, page 172:

     I stepped out of my tent in Marrakech one night to get a bar of candy and caught your dose of clap when that Wac I never even saw before hissed me into the bushes.

3. (transitive, intransitive) To condemn or express contempt (for someone or something) by hissing.

   The crowd booed and hissed her off the stage.

   • 1599 (first performance), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Iulius Cæsar”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii]:

     If the tag-rag people did not clap him and hiss him, according as he pleased and displeased them, as they use to do the players in the theatre, I am no true man.

   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Ezekiel 27:36:

     The merchants among the people shall hiss at thee […]

   • 1653, Henry More, chapter XII, in An Antidote against Atheisme, or An Appeal to the Natural Faculties of the Minde of Man, whether There Be Not a God, London: […] Roger Daniel, […], →OCLC, book I, page 102:

     VVherefore this Religious affection vvhich nature has implanted, and as ſtrongly rooted in Man as the feare of death or the love of vvomen, vvould be the moſt enormous ſlip or bungle ſhe could commit, ſo that ſhe vvould ſo ſhamefully faile in the laſt Act, in this contrivance of the nature of Man, that inſtead of a Plaudite ſhe vvould deſerve to be hiſſed off the Stage.

   • 1793, Elizabeth Inchbald, Every One Has His Fault‎, London: G.G.J. and J. Robinson, Prologue:

     The Play, perhaps, has many things amiss:
     Well, let us then reduce the point to this,
     Let only those that have no failings, hiss.

   • 1803, Robert Charles Dallas, The History of the Maroons‎, London: Longman and Rees, Volume 1, Letter 5, p. 145:

     As the culprits went through the town and plantations they were laughed at, hissed, and hooted by the slaves […]

   • 1961, Walker Percy, The Moviegoer‎, New York: Ivy Books, published 1988, Part 1, Chapter 4, p. 38:

     How well I remember, her stepmother told her, the days when we Wagnerians used to hiss old Brahms—O for the rapturous rebellious days of youth.

4. (transitive) To utter (something) with a hissing sound.
   • 1761, Robert Lloyd, An Epistle to C. Churchill‎, London: William Flexney, page 7:

     Lies oft o’erthrown with ceaseless Venom spread,
     Still hiss out Scandal from their Hydra Head,

   • 1855, Alfred Tennyson, “Maud”, in Maud, and Other Poems, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 20:

     the long-necked geese of the world that are ever hissing dispraise […]

   • 2011 December 14, John Elkington, “John Elkington”, in The Guardian‎:

     It turns out that the driver of the red Ferrari that caused the crash wasn't, as I first guessed, a youngster, but a 60-year-old. Clearly, he had energy to spare, which was more than could be said about a panel I listened to around the same time as the crash. Indeed, someone hissed in my ear during a First Magazine awards ceremony in London's imposing Marlborough House on 7 December: "What we need is more old white men on the stage."

   • 2012, Hilary Mantel, Bring Up the Bodies, New York: Henry Holt, Part 2, “Master of Phantoms,”

     All day from the queen’s rooms, shouting, slamming doors, running feet: hissed conversations in undertones.

5. (intransitive) To move with a hissing sound.

   The arrow hissed through the air.

   • 1718, Alexander Pope, transl., The Iliad of Homer‎, London: Bernard Lintott, Volume 4, Book 15, lines 690-691, p. 192:

     The Troops of Troy recede with sudden Fear,
     While the swift Javelin hiss’d along in Air.

   • 1815, William Wordsworth, “Influence of Natural Objects”, in Poems by William Wordsworth‎, volume 1, London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, page 46:

     All shod with steel
     We hissed along the polished ice […]

   • 1891, Thomas Hardy, chapter XXIII, in Tess of the d’Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented […], volume II, London: James R[ipley] Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., […], →OCLC, phase the third (The Rally), page 20:

     All the preceding afternoon and night heavy thunderstorms had hissed down upon the meads, and washed some of the hay into the river […]

   • 1997, Annie Proulx, “Brokeback Mountain”, in Close Range: Brokeback Mountain and Other Stories‎, London: Harper Perennial, published 2005, page 283:

     Ennis del Mar wakes before five, wind rocking the trailer, hissing in around the aluminum door and window frames.

6. (transitive) To emit or eject (something) with a hissing sound.
   • 1938, Graham Greene, Brighton Rock‎, London: Heinemann, Part 2, Chapter 1, p. 72:

     The man in white pyjamas hissed soda into his glass.

   • 1939, John Steinbeck, chapter 26, in The Grapes of Wrath‎, New York: Viking, page 500:

     The radiator bubbled and hissed steam.

   • 1976, Ira Levin, The Boys from Brazil‎, New York: Dell, published 1977, Part 1, p. 16:

     He hissed air intently through a gap in his upper teeth.

7. (transitive) To whisper, especially angrily or urgently.
   • 1881, Elim Henry D'Avigdor, Across Country‎, Bradbury, Agnew:

     "Are you quite sure of it," she hissed into his ear, "Mr Fang, Junior?"

   • 1968, James A. Emanuel, Theodore L. Gross, Dark symphony, →ISBN:

     "Oh please," she said, "don't let him see us!" I wouldn't let her push me away. "Stop!" she hissed. "He'll see us!"

• hizz

• IHSS, Shis

Borrowed from Arabic حِسّ (ḥiss).

• IPA^(key): [hisː]

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hiss (definite accusative hissi, plural hisslər)

1. feeling, sensation

   Synonym: duyğu

The final double consonant in Azerbaijani nouns is usually reduced in the locative and ablative singular and plural; hiss and küll are exceptions to this rule, as they would otherwise be confused with his and kül (“Azərbaycan dilində hansı sözlərin yazılışının dəyişəcəyi açıqlanıb”, in Report.az‎, 2018 January).

• hiss etmək (“to feel”)

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hiss

1. singular imperative of hissen
2. (colloquial) first-person singular present of hissen

hiss

1. Alternative form of his (“his”)

From h +‎ -iss.

hiss m (definite singular hissen, indefinite plural hissar, definite plural hissane)

1. (music) B-sharp

From hissa (“hoist”). Attested since 1824.

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hiss c

1. elevator, lift