hump
nounverbcommon in dialogue
- //hʌmp//
- /[hɐmp]/
A mound of earth.
noun
- 1
A mound of earth.
- 2
A speed bump or speed hump.
- 3
A deformity in humans caused by abnormal curvature of the upper spine.
- 4
A rounded fleshy mass, such as on a camel or zebu.
Fat, melted down from the hump of the camel, is suggested in an Oriental manual as an aphrodisiac aid.
- 5
slangAn act of sexual intercourse.
- 6
slangA bad mood.
She's got the hump with me.
Go away! You're giving me the right hump.
- 7
slangA painfully boorish person.
That guy is such a hump!
- 8
A wave that forms in front of an operating hovercraft and impedes progress at low speeds.
Etymology
Probably borrowed from Dutch homp (“hump, lump”) or Middle Low German hump (“heap, hill, stump”), from Old Saxon *hump (“hill, heap, thick piece”), from Proto-Germanic *humpaz (“hip, height”), from Proto-Indo-European *kumb- (“curved”). Compare Proto-Germanic *huppōną (“to hop”), from Proto-Indo-European *kewb-, *ḱewb- (unnasalised root), and English hub (a softened variant without nasal?). Cognate with West Frisian hompe (“lump, chunk”), Icelandic huppur (“flank”), Welsh cwm (“a hollow”), Latin incumbō (“to lie down”), Albanian sumbull (“round button, bud”), Ancient Greek κύμβη (kúmbē, “bowl”), Avestan 𐬑𐬎𐬨𐬠𐬀 (xumba, “pot”), Sanskrit कुम्ब (kúmba, “thick end of bone”). Replaced, and perhaps influenced by, Old English crump (“crooked, bent”). More at cramp.
verb
- 1
To bend something into a hump.
The cattle were very uncomfortable, standing humped up in the bushes.
- 2
To carry (something), especially with some exertion.
For travellers have to carry bags, / And swagmen have to hump their swags / Like bottle-ohs or ragmen.
- 3
slangTo rhythmically thrust the pelvis in a manner conducive to sexual intercourse. To dry-hump.
Stop humping the table, you sicko.
- 4
slangTo rhythmically thrust the pelvis in a manner conducive to sexual intercourse. To have sex (with).
- 5
datedTo exert oneself; to make an effort.
Lessons are keeping me humping now, and will probably do so all summer.
- 6
datedTo vex or annoy.
- 7
To shunt wagons / freight cars over the hump in a hump yard.
In the first phase of the new yard's operation, from March 6 last, it was wisely decided to restrict the yard's use to allow for any "teething" ailments with complex electronic gadgets, so when I visited Margam early in May it was working well below its capacity, humping about 1,000 wagons a day; […].
- 8
obsoleteTo botch or spoil.
"Why, sir," said one patterer, "I've gone out with a mate to work a litany, and he's humped it in no time." To 'hump,' in street parlance, is equivalent to 'botch,' in more genteel colloquialism.
Forms
- plural
- humps
- past tense
- humped
- past participle
- humped
- present participle
- humping
- third person singular
- humps