gab
English[edit]
Pronunciation[edit]
Etymology 1[edit]
Inherited from Middle English gab, gabbe, from Old Norse gabb (“jest, mockery”) (whence also Old French gab, gap (“mockery, derision, scorn”)). Cognate with Icelandic gabb (“hoax”).
Noun[edit]
gab (countable and uncountable, plural gabs)
- Idle chatter.
- The mouth or gob.
- One of the open-forked ends of rods controlling reversing in early steam engines.
- 1940 July, S. Richards, “Locomotive Valve gear Development”, in Railway Magazine, page 412:
- Loose eccentric reversing gear gave way about 1836 to the early forms of gab motion. [...] In 1840 Stephenson evolved a motion in which the gabs were connected directly to the valve spindle.
Derived terms[edit]
Translations[edit]
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Etymology 2[edit]
From Middle English gabben, from Old English gabban (“to scoff, mock, delude, jest”) and Old Norse gabba (“to mock, make sport of”); both from Proto-Germanic *gabbōną (“to mock, jest”), from Proto-Indo-European *ghabh- (“to be split, be forked, gape”). Cognate with Scots gab (“to mock, prate”), North Frisian gabben (“to jest, sport”), Middle Dutch gabben (“to mock”), Middle Low German gabben (“to jest, have fun”).
Verb[edit]
gab (third-person singular simple present gabs, present participle gabbing, simple past and past participle gabbed)
- (intransitive, obsolete) To jest; to tell lies in jest; exaggerate; lie.
- 1866, Charles Kingsley, chapter 12, in Hereward the Wake, London: Nelson, page 181:
- He would chant his own doughty deeds, and “gab,” as the Norman word was, in painful earnest, while they gabbed only in sport, and outvied each other in impossible fanfaronades”
- (intransitive) To talk or chatter a lot, usually on trivial subjects.
- 1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, 1st Australian edition, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1962, →OCLC, page 26:
- "That Mrs. Mender gives a bloke the ear-ache; thinks a bloke's got all day to waste listening to her gab."
- (transitive, obsolete) To speak or tell falsely.
Derived terms[edit]
Translations[edit]
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Anagrams[edit]
Amanab[edit]
Noun[edit]
gab
- a large dove
Danish[edit]
Etymology[edit]
From Old Norse gap, verbal noun to gapa (“to gape”).
Noun[edit]
gab n (singular definite gabet, plural indefinite gab)
Inflection[edit]
German[edit]
Pronunciation[edit]
Verb[edit]
gab
Old French[edit]
Alternative forms[edit]
Etymology[edit]
Noun[edit]
gab oblique singular, m (oblique plural gas, nominative singular gas, nominative plural gab)
- joke
- c. 1177, Chrétien de Troyes, Le Chevalier de la Charrette, page 50 (of the Livres de Poche Lettres gothiques edition, →ISBN, line 96:
- Est ce a certes ou a gas?
- Is this certain or in jest?
Related terms[edit]
References[edit]
- Godefroy, Frédéric, Dictionnaire de l’ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IXe au XVe siècle (1881) (gab)
- gab on the Anglo-Norman On-Line Hub
Old High German[edit]
Alternative forms[edit]
Verb[edit]
gab
- English 1-syllable words
- English terms with IPA pronunciation
- English terms with audio links
- Rhymes:English/æb
- Rhymes:English/æb/1 syllable
- English terms inherited from Middle English
- English terms derived from Middle English
- English terms derived from Old Norse
- English lemmas
- English nouns
- English uncountable nouns
- English countable nouns
- English terms with quotations
- English terms derived from Old English
- English terms derived from Proto-Germanic
- English terms derived from Proto-Indo-European
- English verbs
- English intransitive verbs
- English terms with obsolete senses
- English transitive verbs
- en:Talking
- Amanab lemmas
- Amanab nouns
- Danish terms derived from Old Norse
- Danish lemmas
- Danish nouns
- Danish neuter nouns
- German 1-syllable words
- German terms with IPA pronunciation
- German terms with audio links
- Rhymes:German/aːp
- Rhymes:German/aːp/1 syllable
- German non-lemma forms
- German verb forms
- Old French terms borrowed from Old Norse
- Old French terms derived from Old Norse
- Old French lemmas
- Old French nouns
- Old French masculine nouns
- Old French terms with quotations
- Old High German non-lemma forms
- Old High German verb forms