different between boo vs hiss

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /bu?/
• Rhymes: -u?

Etymology 1

From earlier (15c.) boh, coined to create a loud and startling sound. Compare Middle English bus! (“bang!”, interjection), Latin bo? (“cry aloud, roar, shout”, verb), Ancient Greek ???? (boá?, “shout”, verb).

Interjection

boo

1. A loud exclamation intended to scare someone, especially a child. Usually used when one has been hidden from the victim and then suddenly appeared unexpectedly.
2. Used ironically in a situation where one had the opportunity to scare someone by speaking suddenly.
3. An exclamation used by a member or many members of an audience, as at a stage play or sports game, to indicate derision or disapproval of what has just occurred.

Derived terms

• peekaboo

Translations

Noun

boo (plural boos)

1. A derisive shout made to indicate disapproval.

Translations

Verb

boo (third-person singular simple present boos, present participle booing, simple past and past participle booed)

1. (intransitive) To shout extended boos derisively.

   When he took the podium, the crowd booed.

   • 2004, The New Yorker, 18 Oct 2004

     Nobody booed and nobody clapped
2. (transitive) To shout extended boos at, as a form of derision.

   The protesters loudly booed the visiting senator.

Antonyms

• cheer

Translations

Etymology 2

From beau.

Noun

boo (plural boos)

1. (US, Canada, African-American Vernacular, slang) A close acquaintance or significant other.

Etymology 3

Noun

boo (uncountable)

1. (slang) Cannabis.
   • 1967, George E. Andrews, Simon Vinkenoog, The Book of Grass: An Anthology on Indian Hemp (page 213)

     […] sexually promiscuous girl who smoked boo all day and socialized with junkies when she wasn't busy banging away in bed […]

   • 1984, Raphael S. Ezekiel, Voices from the corner: poverty and racism in the inner city (page 56)

     Like I have smoked boo, drunk whiskey, and shot dope, and I was going through all three bags at once.

   • 2019, Ron Cook, On Guard in the General's Chorus (page 2)

     Grandpa doesn't want Grandma and their kids and grandkids to know that he had to get penicillin shots all the time, or that he smoked boo (marijuana) on a daily basis, or that he dealt in the black market, or that he had yobos (purchased live-in sex slaves).

Etymology 4

Likely onomatopoeic.

Verb

boo (third-person singular simple present boos, present participle booing, simple past and past participle booed)

1. (now rare, Northern England) To make a sound characteristic of cattle; to moo.

Further reading

• boo at OneLook Dictionary Search

Anagrams

• OBO, OOB, OoB, o/b/o, obo

Dumbea

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?bøo/

Noun

boo

1. moon

References

• Leenhardt, M. (1946) Langues et dialectes de l'Austro-Mèlanèsie. Cited in: "?Du?bea" in Greenhill, S.J., Blust, R., & Gray, R.D. (2008). The Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database: From Bioinformatics to Lexomics. Evolutionary Bioinformatics, 4:271-283.
• Shintani, T.L.A. & Païta, Y. (1990) Dictionnaire de la langue de Païta, Nouméa: Sociéte d'etudes historiques de Nouvelle-Calédonie. Cited in: "Drubea" in Greenhill, S.J., Blust, R., & Gray, R.D. (2008). The Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database: From Bioinformatics to Lexomics. Evolutionary Bioinformatics, 4:271-283.

French

Etymology

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Noun

boo m (uncountable)

1. (linguistics) Boo

Synonyms

• boko

Latin

Alternative forms

• bov?

Etymology

From b?s +? -?.

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /?bo.o?/, [?bo?]
• (Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /?bo.o/, [?b???]

Verb

bo? (present infinitive bo?re, perfect active bo?v?, supine bo?tum); first conjugation

1. (intransitive) I cry aloud, bellow, roar; bray.
2. (transitive) I call loudly upon; bellow, cry or roar forth.

Conjugation

Synonyms

• (bellow, roar): ?nfrem?, m?gi?, rud?

Derived terms

• bo?ti?
• bo?tus
• rebo?

References

• boo in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• boo in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers

Scots

Etymology

From Middle English buwen, bu?en, bowen, from Old English b?gan, from Proto-West Germanic *beugan, from Proto-Germanic *beugan?, from Proto-Indo-European *b??g?- (“to bend”). Cognate with English bow, Dutch buigen, German biegen, Danish bue.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /bu?/

Verb

boo (third-person singular present booes, present participle booin, past boo'd, past participle boo'd)

1. to bow, to stoop
2. to bend, to curve
3. to make something bend or curve

Noun

boo (plural boos)

1. a bow (of greeting)

English

Etymology

From Middle English hissen, probably of onomatopoeic origin. Compare Middle Dutch hissen, hisschen.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /h?s/
• Rhymes: -?s

Noun

hiss (plural hisses)

1. A sibilant sound, such as that made by a snake or escaping steam; an unvoiced fricative.
   • c. 1590, William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part 2, Act III, Scene 2,^[1]

     Their music frightful as the serpent’s hiss,

     And boding screech-owls make the concert full!

   • 1667, John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book 6, lines 212-213,^[2]

     […] over head the dismal hiss

     Of fiery Darts in flaming volies flew,

   • 1717, John Dryden (translator), Ovid’s Metamorphoses, London: Jacob Tonson, Book 13, “The Story of Acis, Polyphemus and Galatea,” p. ,^[3]

     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, Far from the Madding Crowd, Chapter 31,^[4]

     […] 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, Lie Down in Darkness, New York: Vintage, 1992, Chapter 6, p. 292,^[5]

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

2. An expression of disapproval made using such a sound.
   • 1583, John Foxe, Acts and Monuments, Volume 2, Part 2, London: John Day, 4th edition, “The Oration of Byshop Brookes in closing vp this examination agaynst Doctour Cranmer Archbishop of Caunterbury,” p. 1878,^[6]

     […] 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,^[7]

     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, Innocents Abroad, Chapter 29,^[8]

     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!

Derived terms

• hissy
• plasmaspheric hiss

Translations

Verb

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, Arthur Golding (translator), The XV. Bookes of P. Ouidius Naso, entytuled Metamorphosis, London: Willyam Seres, Book 12, p. 152,^[9]

     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, The Italian, London: T. Cadell Jun. & W. Davies, Volume 2, Chapter 7, p. 236,^[10]

     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, A Fine Balance, Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, Chapter 10, p. 487,^[11]

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

2. (transitive, intransitive) To condemn or express contempt (for someone or something) by hissing.
   • c. 1599, William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, Act I, Scene 2,^[12]

     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, King James Version of the Bible, Ezekiel 27.36,^[13]

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

   • 1793, Elizabeth Inchbald, Every One Has His Fault, London: G.G.J. and J. Robinson, Prologue,^[14]

     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,^[15]

     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, 1988, Part 1, Chapter 4, p. 38,^[16]

     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.

3. (transitive) To utter (something) with a hissing sound.
   • 1761, Robert Lloyd, An Epistle to C. Churchill, London: William Flexney, p. 7,^[17]

     Lies oft o’erthrown with ceaseless Venom spread,

     Still hiss out Scandal from their Hydra Head,

   • 1855, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “Maud” in Maud, and Other Poems, London: Moxon, p. 20,^[18]

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

   • 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.

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

   The arrow hissed through the air.

   • 1718, Alexander Pope (translator), The Iliad of Homer, London: Bernard Lintott, Volume 4, Book 15, lines 690-691, p. 192,^[20]

     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, London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, Volume 1, p. 46,^[21]

     All shod with steel

     We hissed along the polished ice […]

   • 1891, Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d’Urbervilles, Chapter ,^[22]

     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, 2005, p. 283,^[23]

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

5. (transitive) To emit or eject (something) with a hissing sound.
   • 1938, Graham Greene, Brighton Rock, London: Heinemann, Part 2, Chapter 1, p. 72,^[24]

     The man in white pyjamas hissed soda into his glass.

   • 1939, John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath, New York: Viking, Chapter 26, p. 500,^[25]

     The radiator bubbled and hissed steam.

   • 1976, Ira Levin, The Boys from Brazil, New York: Dell, 1977, Part 1, p. 16,^[26]

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

6. (transitive) To whisper, especially angrily or urgently.

Derived terms

• boo hiss
• hissable
• hiss-and-tell
• hisser
• hissing hot

Translations

See also

• hizz

Anagrams

• IHSS, Shis

Azerbaijani

Etymology

Ultimately from Arabic ????? (?iss). Compare to Turkish his.

Noun

hiss (definite accusative hissi, plural hissl?r)

1. feeling, sensation

   Synonym: duy?u

Spelling note

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 ( “Az?rbaycan dilind? hans? sözl?rin yaz?l???n?n d?yi??c?yi aç?qlan?b”, in Report.az?^[28], January 2018).

Declension

Derived terms

• hiss etm?k (“to feel”)

German

Pronunciation

Verb

hiss

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

Middle English

Pronoun

hiss

1. Alternative form of his (“his”)

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology

From h +? -iss.

Noun

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

1. (music) B-sharp

Swedish

Pronunciation

Noun

hiss c

1. elevator, lift

Declension