Etymologically
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yelp

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Pronunciation

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English yelpen (“to boast, brag”),[2][3][4][5] inherited from Old English ġielpan (“to boast, exult”), Anglian gelpan, also gilpan and gylpan,[2][4][6][7][8] from Proto-Germanic *gelpaną.[1][4][9] It is cognate with Old Saxon galpōn (“to cry aloud, boast”), Old High German gelph (“outcry, revelry”), Middle High German gelfen (“to boast”), Old Norse gjalpa (“to yelp”) and gjalp (“boasting”),[4][6][10][2] and with Low German galpen (“to croak”).[10][11] The Old English noun ġielp (“boasting, pride, arrogance”) comes from the same source.[2][10][5] Most dictionaries trace the base to an imitative root,[12][13][14][15] and Barnhart and Klein connect it with Lithuanian gulbinti (“to praise”) and Proto-Indo-European *ghelb-,[4][5][6] which Klein sees as an extension of the imitative base Proto-Indo-European *ghel- (“to cry out”), also the source of yell.[6][2][3] Orel thinks the Germanic verb probably an emphatic form of the one that gave yell.[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

To boast, glory or vaunt, in Old English: Barnhart dates gielpan to about 725, in Beowulf,[4] and the OED's first quotation is from Alfred's translation of Boethius.[10] The Exeter Book has Ðæt hý gielpan ne þorftan dǽdum, that they should not boast of deeds.[7]

Semantic evolution

In Old and Middle English the verb meant to boast, a sense lost by about 1425,[10][12] and the noun meant boasting or pride, lost by about 1500.[10][12] From the later Middle English sense "to cry aloud, sing with a loud voice" (about 1450 to 1550),[10][13] the sense of a dog's sharp, shrill cry arose in the 16th century:[13][10] the noun is recorded first, in Dunbar's poems of the early 1500s, and the verb in 1553, probably from the noun.[4][2][10] Hoad notes that the noun had this sense earlier in Scots.[14] Johnson (1755) defined yelp as to bark "as a beagle-hound after his prey", quoting Shakespeare's "yelping kennel of French curs".[16] From the 18th century the verb could also mean to complain or whine (1706), and the noun was used figuratively (1775, in Johnson).[10] In northern English dialect it was also used of a mouse squeaking or a bird chirping, with forms such as yalp and yilp.[17]

Timeline

  • c. 725 – Old English gielpan, to boast, in Beowulf (Barnhart's dating).[4] Dictionary.com dates the word to before 900.[18]
  • c. 1200 – the noun yellp, boasting, in the Ormulum; the verb yelpen, to boast, in the Ancrene Riwle.[4]
  • c. 1400 – transitive, to call out, utter (obsolete).[10]
  • c. 1450 – to cry aloud; to sing loudly (obsolete by 1550).[10][12]
  • 1501 – noun, the sharp, shrill cry of a dog.[5] The OED's first quotation is from Dunbar, before 1513.[10][4]
  • 1553 – verb, to utter a yelp, of dogs and some birds.[10][4]
  • 1654 – transitive, to utter with a yelp.[10]
  • 1706 – figurative, to complain, whine.[10]

Meanings

Verb

  1. Of a dog or other animal, to give a short, sharp, high-pitched cry or bark: The puppy yelped when its tail was stepped on.[11][5][10]
  2. Of a person, to cry out sharply or shrilly, as in pain or alarm: He yelped as the cold water hit him.[5][11]
  3. To say something with a yelp or in a shrill voice.[10][5]
  4. (obsolete, Old English–1425) To boast or speak vaingloriously.[10][12]

Noun

  1. A short, sharp, high-pitched cry or bark of a dog or other animal.[11][5][10]
  2. A sharp cry of a person: a yelp of surprise.[5][11]
  3. (obsolete, Old English–1500) Boasting; vainglorious talk.[10][12]

Word family

  • yelper
  • outyelp

References

  1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  3. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  6. ^ a b c d Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  7. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
  8. ^ Clark Hall, J. R. (1960), A Concise Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, 4th ed., with a supplement by H. D. Meritt, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  9. ^ a b Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
  10. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  11. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  12. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  13. ^ a b c Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  14. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  15. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  16. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  17. ^ 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)
  18. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House