Dictionary

hirple en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• /ˈhɜː.pəl/ (UK)

Etymology

A word of unknown origin, first recorded in Scots sources from the late fifteenth century; but probably from Old Norse herpast (“to suffer from cramp”) the middle voice verb. Compare the Icelandic herpa (“to contract, to draw together”).

Meanings

1. (Scotland) A limp.

Forms

hirple en · VERB

Pronunciation

• /ˈhɜː.pəl/ (UK)

Etymology

A word of unknown origin, first recorded in Scots sources from the late fifteenth century; but probably from Old Norse herpast (“to suffer from cramp”) the middle voice verb. Compare the Icelandic herpa (“to contract, to draw together”).

Meanings

1. (Northern, Scotland, UK, intransitive) To walk with a limp, to drag a limb, to walk lamely; to move with a gait somewhere between walking and crawling.
   • I saw the hurcheon and the hare In hidlings hirpling here and there, 1597, Alexander Montgomery, The Cherrie and the Slae:
   • Around lunchtime he hirpled down the corridor to the Gents. 2022, Liam McIlvanney, The Heretic, page 513:
   • Get you on that bicycle and hurry on, and I'll hirple after you the best I can. 1922, John Buchan, Huntingtower:
   • A woman hirpled along the corridor towards them with the aid of a walking frame. 2015, Kate Atkinson, A God in Ruins, →ISBN, page 136:
   • He is hasped and hooped and hirpling with pain, limping and looped in it. 1999, Seamus Heaney, Beowulf, London: Faber and Faber, page 31:

Forms

Synonyms

hobble · hurple