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Etymology and origin of the English word whiz

English has two words spelled whiz, also written whizz: the imitative word for a humming or hissing sound, and the noun for an expert.[1][2][3]

Pronunciation

whiz1 humming or hissing sound

Confidence
Established
Formation
Onomatopoeia
First attested
1547 before 1547, a translation of Virgil's Aeneid

Etymology

The word for the humming or hissing sound is of imitative origin.[5][3][1][2][6][7] Weekley compares whir and hiss,[8] Chambers wheeze,[9] and Dictionary.com fizz.[10] Partridge calls it plainly echoic and derives from it whizzer and whizbang.[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of something rushing through the air, to make a humming or hissing sound: before 1547, in a translation of Virgil's Aeneid.[3][12] Etymonline dates the verb to the 1540s, and Merriam-Webster Unabridged gives 1582 as the first known use of the intransitive verb.[5][1]

Semantic evolution

From the sound, the verb passed to moving swiftly with such a sound (1591 in the Historical Thesaurus) and then to moving or doing something quickly without any sound at all.[12][6][2] The noun, the sound or a movement accompanied by it, is recorded from 1620,[3][1][12] or from the 1610s in Etymonline.[5] Johnson (1755) defined the verb as "to make a loud humming noise", quoting Shakespeare and Dryden.[13] A transitive use, to hurl or convey something swiftly, followed in the 19th century, and technically to dry something by whirling it (1882).[12] In American slang the noun meant a bargain or agreement from 1869, in Mark Twain,[14][12][6] and it was applied to something remarkable from 1908,[12][3] a use that Green's Dictionary of Slang traces instead to wizard.[14] Whizzer, something extraordinary, is from 1888.[5] Twentieth-century slang added the practice of picking pockets, often in on the whizz (1925),[12][14][6] the verb "to urinate" (1929)[5][12][14] with the noun in take a whiz,[1][15] and, in Britain, amphetamines.[15][6] In Scottish and northern English dialect the verb could also mean to spin round or to bustle about.[16]

Timeline

  • before 1547 – verb, to make a humming or hissing sound as of something rushing through the air.[3][12]
  • 1591 – verb, to move swiftly with such a sound.[12]
  • 1607 – verb, to wheeze (obsolete by 1748).[12]
  • 1620 – noun, a humming or hissing sound; a movement with such a sound.[3][1][12]
  • 1812 – interjection and adverb imitating the sound.[12]
  • 1869 – noun, US slang, a bargain or agreement.[14][12]
  • 1908 – noun, something remarkable.[12][3]
  • 1925 – noun, slang, pickpocketing; a pickpocket.[12]
  • 1929 – verb, slang, to urinate.[5][12][14]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To move very fast with a humming, buzzing or hissing sound, as an arrow or ball through the air: Pebbles whizzed past the windscreen.[1][15][2]
  2. To move, go or do something quickly: She whizzed through the crossword in ten minutes.[2][15]
  3. Of time, to pass quickly.[2]
  4. To throw or spin something rapidly; to whirl food in a blender.[2][1]
  5. (slang) To urinate.[2][12][14]

Noun

  1. A humming, buzzing or hissing sound, or a movement accompanied by one.[1][15][6]
  2. (slang) An act of urinating, especially in take a whiz.[1][15]
  3. (slang) Amphetamine.[15][6]
  4. (slang, chiefly US) The practice of picking pockets; a pickpocket.[6][12][14]

Adverb

  1. With a whiz.[1][12]

Word family

  • whizzingly
  • whizbang
  • whizzer

whiz2 expert, clever person

Confidence
Probable
Formation
Clipping
First attested
1914
Ultimate origin
English wiz

Etymology

The word for an expert is probably from English an alteration of wiz,[1][2] a shortening of wizard recorded from 1902,[1] influenced by whiz1.[1][3][17] Barnhart and Etymonline instead think it probably a special use of the imitative word in the sense "something remarkable" (1908), and offer the alteration of wizard only as an alternative.[3][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

A very clever or skilful person, an expert: 1914, in American English.[3][1][12]

Semantic evolution

The compound whiz kid dates from the 1930s;[5] Etymonline takes it as a play on the quiz kids of a radio programme.[5] The shortened spelling wiz is still used beside whiz for the expert.[15][1]

Timeline

  • 1914 – whiz, a very clever person, an expert.[3][1][12]
  • 1930s – whiz kid.[5]

Meanings

Noun

  1. (informal) A person who is exceptionally skilful or able, usually in a particular field: a whiz at chess.[1][15][2][12]

Word family

  • whiz kid

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  4. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  7. ^ Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  8. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  9. ^ The Chambers Dictionary (2014), 13th ed., Edinburgh: Chambers
  10. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  11. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
  12. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
  13. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  14. ^ a b c d e f g h Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
  15. ^ a b c d e f g h i Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  16. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
  17. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
Cite this entry

“Whiz.” Etymologically, 12 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/en/whiz. Accessed 13 Nov. 2026.

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