Online dictionaryOnline dictionary
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Hump   /həmp/   Listen
noun
Hump  n.  
1.
A protuberance; especially, the protuberance formed by a crooked back.
2.
(Zool.) A fleshy protuberance on the back of an animal, as a camel or whale.
3.
(Railroad) A portion of a switchyard with a slanting track in which freight cars may coast without an engine and be sorted through a series of switches.



verb
Hump  v. t.  
1.
To form into a hump; to make hump-shaped; to hunch; often with up. "The cattle were very uncomfortable, standing humped up in the bushes."
2.
To put or carry on the (humped) back; to shoulder; hence, to carry, in general. (Slang, Australia) "Having collected a sufficient quantity, we humped it out of the bush."
3.
To bend or gather together for strenuous effort, as in running; to do or effect by such effort; to exert; usually reflexively or with it; as, you must hump yourself. (Slang, U. S.) "A half dozen other negroes, some limping and all scared, were humping it across a meadow."
4.
(Railroad) To sort freight cars by means of a hump.
5.
To engage in sexual intercourse with. (Vulgar Slang, U. S.)






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |
Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar





"Hump" Quotes from Famous Books



... the saddle An' you ketch your stirrup, too, An' you try to light a-straddle Like a woolly buckaroo; But he drops his head an' switches, Then he makes a backward jump, Out of reach your stirrup twitches But your right spur grabs his hump. ...
— Songs of the Cattle Trail and Cow Camp • Various

... hot, dusty cars. Just then some one called, "See the whale," and looking quick Tom and Retta saw what seemed a fountain of water rising high in the air about half a mile away. Soon another went up, and two or three more, for the gray hump-backed whales like this stretch of smooth bay. They are warm-blooded animals and not fish at all, so they must come to the top of the waves for air to breathe. The air and water spout out through ...
— Stories of California • Ella M. Sexton

... what it meant. The little elf called out: 'It's my folk wanting me,' and away he fled up the chimney, leaving the tailor more dead than alive." In the neighbouring county of Dumfries the story is told with more gusto. The gudewife goes to the hump-backed tailor, and says: "Wullie, I maun awa' to Dunse about my wab, and I dinna ken what to do wi' the bairn till I come back: ye ken it's but a whingin', screechin', skirlin' wallidreg—but we maun bear wi' dispensations. I wad wuss ye,' quoth she, 'to tak ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland

... "but they've always rather gone in for the useful, I take it. Had to, most likely. They'd be all right, too, if they didn't live so. They're a good sort, an awfully good sort. But, ginger, how a fellow'd have to hump to keep up with 'em! I don't try. I do a little, and then sit back and call ...
— The Camerons of Highboro • Beth B. Gilchrist

... aesthetic, and in its place we have prodigious bustles and immense trains, by which an astonishing quantity of material is thrown behind the body, suggesting in some instances a toboggan slide, in others the unseemly hump on the back of a camel. This is the era of the enormous bustle and the ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 22, September, 1891 • Various


More quotes...



Copyright © 2025 Dictionary One.com