hail

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See also: hæil

English[edit]

English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Pronunciation[edit]

Etymology 1[edit]

From Middle English hayle, haile, hail, hawel, haghil, haȝel, from Old English hæġl, hæġel, hagol (hail), from Proto-West Germanic *hagl, from Proto-Germanic *haglaz, of uncertain origin. Either from Proto-Indo-European *kagʰlos (pebble); or, from *ḱoḱló-, a reduplication of *ḱel- (cold). Cognate with Saterland Frisian Hail (hail), West Frisian heil (hail), Dutch hagel (hail), Low German Hagel (hail), German Hagel (hail), Danish hagl (hail), Swedish hagel (hail), Icelandic hagl (hail). Compare also Old Norse héla (frost).

Root-cognates outside of Germanic include Welsh caill (testicle), Breton kell (testicle), Lithuanian šešėlis (shade, shadow), Ancient Greek κάχληξ (kákhlēx, pebble), Albanian çakëll (pebble), Sanskrit शिशिर (śíśira, cool, cold).

Noun[edit]

hail (countable and uncountable, plural hails)

  1. (meteorology, uncountable) Balls or pieces of ice falling as precipitation, often in connection with a thunderstorm.
  2. (meteorology, countable) An occurrence of this type of precipitation; a hailstorm.
  3. (countable, by extension) A rapid, intense barrage by a large number of projectiles or other objects.
    • 2019 February 27, Drachinifel, 40:01 from the start, in The Battle of Samar - Odds? What are those?[1], archived from the original on 3 November 2022:
      Their lack of good intelligence also meant that they vastly overestimated the size of their foes for far too long, hails of armor-piercing shells doing comparatively little damage compared to the high explosive that they should have been using.
Derived terms[edit]
Translations[edit]

Etymology 2[edit]

From Middle English haylen, haulien, hawelien, from Old English hagolian, hagalian (to hail), from Proto-West Germanic *haglōn, from Proto-Germanic *haglōną (to hail), from the noun (see above). Cognate with Saterland Frisian hailje (to hail), West Frisian heilje (to hail), Dutch hagelen (to hail), German Low German hageln (to hail), German hageln (to hail), Danish hagle (to hail), Swedish hagla (to hail), Norwegian Nynorsk hagle, hagla (to hail), Faroese hegla (to hail), Icelandic hagla (to hail).

Verb[edit]

hail (third-person singular simple present hails, present participle hailing, simple past and past participle hailed)

  1. (impersonal) For hailstones to fall from the sky.
    They say it's going to hail tomorrow.
  2. (intransitive) To send or release hail.
    The cloud would hail down furiously within a few minutes.
  3. To pour down in rapid succession.
Derived terms[edit]
Translations[edit]

Etymology 3[edit]

From Middle English heil (healthy, sound), from Old Norse heill, from Proto-Germanic *hailaz (whole, entire, healthy). The verb is from Middle English heilen, itself from the adjective. Doublet of whole, hale, and heil.

Adjective[edit]

hail (comparative hailer, superlative hailest)

  1. (obsolete) Healthy, whole, safe.

Verb[edit]

hail (third-person singular simple present hails, present participle hailing, simple past and past participle hailed)

  1. (transitive) To greet; give salutation to; salute.
    • 1667, John Milton, “Book I”, in Paradise Lost. [], London: [] [Samuel Simmons], [], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: [], London: Basil Montagu Pickering [], 1873, →OCLC, lines 249–252:
      [] Farewel happy Fields / Where Joy for ever dwells: Hail horrours, hail / Infernal world, and thou profoundeſt Hell / Receive they new Poſſeſſor: []
  2. (transitive) To name; to designate; to call.
    He was hailed as a hero.
  3. (transitive) To call out loudly in order to gain the attention of.
    Hail a taxi.
    • 1995, Alanis Morissette (lyrics and music), “Hand In My Pocket”, in Jagged Little Pill:
      'Cause I've got one hand in my pocket / And the other one is hailin' a taxi cab
    1. (transitive, by extension, UK, Australia) To indicate, from a designated stop or otherwise, to the driver of a public transport vehicle that one wishes to board and travel on the vehicle, usually using hand signals such as waving.
      In Melbourne, you would usually have to hail a tram when you are travelling late at night and there are no other passengers waiting at your stop.
  4. (transitive) To signal in order to initiate communication with.
  5. (transitive) In the game of uppies and downies, to throw (the ball) repeatedly up and down at the goal location, in order to score a point.
Derived terms[edit]
Related terms[edit]
Translations[edit]

Interjection[edit]

hail

  1. (archaic or poetic) An exclamation of respectful or reverent salutation, or, occasionally, of familiar greeting.
Derived terms[edit]
Translations[edit]

Anagrams[edit]

Estonian[edit]

Noun[edit]

hail

  1. adessive singular of hai

Irish[edit]

Pronunciation[edit]

Noun[edit]

hail

  1. h-prothesized form of ail

Middle English[edit]

Etymology 1[edit]

Noun[edit]

hail (uncountable)

  1. Alternative form of hayle (hail)

Etymology 2[edit]

Adjective[edit]

hail

  1. Alternative form of heil (healthy, sound)

Noun[edit]

hail (uncountable)

  1. Alternative form of heil (health, welfare)

Scots[edit]

Etymology 1[edit]

From Old English hāl (healthy, safe), from Proto-Germanic *hailaz (whole, safe, sound), from Proto-Indo-European *kéh₂ilos (healthy, whole).

Alternative forms[edit]

Pronunciation[edit]

Adjective[edit]

hail (comparative hailer, superlative hailest)

  1. whole
  2. free or recovered from disease, healthy, wholesome
  3. free from injury, safe, sound, unhurt (of people, parts of the body, etc.)
  4. whole, entire, complete, sound, unbroken, undamaged (of material objects and of time, numbers etc.)
Derived terms[edit]

Noun[edit]

hail (plural hails)

  1. the whole, the whole amount or number

Verb[edit]

hail (third-person singular simple present hails, present participle hailin, simple past hailt, past participle hailt)

  1. to heal, cure

Etymology 2[edit]

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

Pronunciation[edit]

Verb[edit]

hail (third-person singular simple present hails, present participle hailin, simple past hailt, past participle hailt)

  1. (sports) to drive the ball through the goal, etc.
Derived terms[edit]

Noun[edit]

hail (plural hails)

  1. (sports) goal, the shout when a goal is scored, the goal area

Etymology 3[edit]

From Old English hæġl, hæġel, from Proto-Germanic *haglaz, either from Proto-Indo-European *kagʰlos (pebble), or from *ḱoḱló-, a reduplication of *ḱel- (cold).

Pronunciation[edit]

Noun[edit]

hail (uncountable)

  1. (weather) hail, hailstones
  2. small shot, pellets
Derived terms[edit]

Turkish[edit]

Alternative forms[edit]

Etymology[edit]

From Ottoman Turkish حائل (hail), from Arabic حَائِل (ḥāʔil). An Ottoman Turkish homophone from Arabic هَائِل (hāʔil) did not survive to modern Turkish.

Noun[edit]

hail (definite accusative haili, plural hailler) (obsolete)

  1. obstacle
    Synonym: engel

References[edit]

Welsh[edit]

Pronunciation[edit]

Adjective[edit]

hail

  1. h-prothesized form of ail (second)

Mutation[edit]

Welsh mutation
radical soft nasal h-prothesis
ail unchanged unchanged hail
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs.