From Middle English hissen, probably of onomatopoeic origin (compare Arabic هَسْهَسَ (hashasa)). Compare Middle Dutch hissen, hisschen (“to chase away, shoo”), Middle Low German hissen (“to chase, hound, incite”).
Meanings
A sibilant sound, such as that made by a snake or escaping steam; an unvoiced fricative.
Her voice was a hiss, like gas escaping from a bottle of soda. 1951, William Styron, chapter 6, in Lie Down in Darkness, New York: Vintage, published 1992, page 292:
[…] his form was soon covered over by the twilight as his footsteps mixed in with the low hiss of the leafy trees. 1874, Thomas Hardy, “Blame—Fury”, in Far from the Madding Crowd. […], volume II, London: Smith, Elder & Co., […], →OCLC, page 13:
A hundred Reeds, of a prodigious Growth,
Scarce made a Pipe, proportion’d to his Mouth:
Which, when he gave it Wind, the Rocks around,
And watry Plains, the dreadful Hiss resound. 1717, John Dryden [et al.], “Book 13. [The Story of Acis, Polyphemus and Galatea.]”, in Ovid’s Metamorphoses in Fifteen Books. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:
Their music frightful as the serpent’s hiss,
And boding screech-owls make the concert full! 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene ii]:
[…] over head the dismal hiss
Of fiery Darts in flaming volies flew, 1667, John Milton, “Book VI”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC, lines 212-213:
An expression of disapproval made using such a sound.
[…] in open disputations ye haue bene openly conuict, ye haue bene openly driuen out of the schole with hisses […] 1563 March 30 (Gregorian calendar), John Foxe, Actes and Monuments of These Latter and Perillous Dayes, […], London: […] Iohn Day, […], →OCLC, book V, Part 2, The Oration of Byshop Brookes in closing vp this examination agaynst Doctour Cranmer Archbishop of Caunterbury,, page [1878]:
Like a moustachioed pantomime villain relishing boos and hisses from the audience, Trump is oblivious to warnings and protestations from the sane world and simply contemptuous of the lickspittle mob desperately hoping to go unnoticed. 2026 January 24, Michael Pascoe, “America’s mighty economic power has feet of clay”, in Michael West Media:
Once or twice she was encored five and six times in succession, and received with hisses when she appeared, and discharged with hisses and laughter when she had finished—then instantly encored and insulted again! 1869, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter XXIX, in The Innocents Abroad, or The New Pilgrims’ Progress; […], Hartford, Conn.: American Publishing Company. […], →OCLC:
1716, Joseph Addison, The Free-Holder, 16 April, 1716, London: D. Midwinter and J. Tonson, pp. 203-204,
The Actors, in the midst of an innocent old Play, are often startled with unexpected Claps or Hisses; and do not know whether they have been talking like good Subjects, or have spoken Treason.
pt sibilo (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · ru шипе́ние (expression of disapproval) · fi sähinä (expression of disapproval) · hu sziszegés (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · bo སིད་སྒྲ (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · ta சீறு (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · es siseo (expression of disapproval) · de Zischen (expression of disapproval) · it sibilo (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · ro sâsâit (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · lol loseba (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · pl syczenie (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · cs sykot (expression of disapproval) · it soffio (expression of disapproval) · ln loseba (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · te బుస (expression of disapproval) · ru шипе́ние (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · de Fauchen (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · sk syčanie (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · sk sipenie (expression of disapproval) · ms desis (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · tl ngishis (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · bg освиркване (expression of disapproval) · fi sähinä (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · es siseo (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · uk шипіння (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · cmn 嘶 (expression of disapproval) · nl gesis (expression of disapproval) · id desis (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · pam iwis (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · he שריקה (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · nl sis (expression of disapproval) · fr siffler (expression of disapproval) · he נשיפה (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · ar فَحِيح (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · nl sis (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · ar أَزِيز (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · nl tss (expression of disapproval) · cs syčení (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · fi sihinä (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · de Knurren (expression of disapproval) · pt silvo (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · cmn 噝 /咝 (expression of disapproval) · gl silvo (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · bni loseba (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · eo siblo (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · no hvese (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · nl gesis (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · tl higishis (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · bg съскане (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · cs syčení (expression of disapproval) · ca xiulada (expression of disapproval) · cs sykot (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · la sībilus (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · ga siosóg (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · fr sifflement (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · io siso (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · de Fauchen (expression of disapproval) · de Zischen (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · da hvæse (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · ca xiuxiueig (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · sv väsning (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.) · te బుస (sound made by a snake, cat, escaping steam, etc.)
From Middle English hissen, probably of onomatopoeic origin (compare Arabic هَسْهَسَ (hashasa)). Compare Middle Dutch hissen, hisschen (“to chase away, shoo”), Middle Low German hissen (“to chase, hound, incite”).
Meanings
(intransitive) To make a hiss, a sibilant sound of air escaping.
The frying pan hissed and sizzled as Ishvar gently slid ping-pong sized balls into the glistening oil. 1995, Rohinton Mistry, chapter 10, in A Fine Balance, Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, page 487:
As I started to poke it, the snake hissed at me.
And in his wound the seared blood did make a gréeuous sound,
As when a peece of stéele red who tane vp with tongs is drownd
In water by the smith, it spirts and hisseth in the trowgh. 1567, Ovid, “The Twelfth Booke”, in Arthur Golding, transl., The XV. Bookes of P. Ouidius Naso, Entytuled Metamorphosis, […], London: […] Willyam Seres […], →OCLC, folio 152, recto:
The man came back, and said something in a lower voice, to which the other replied, “she sleeps,” or Ellena was deceived by the hissing consonants of some other words. 1797, Ann Ward Radcliffe, chapter 7, in The Italian, volume II, London: T. Cadell Jun. & W. Davies, page 236
The poor cat hissed as it backed away from the approaching man.
(transitive) To call someone by hissing.
I stepped out of my tent in Marrakech one night to get a bar of candy and caught your dose of clap when that Wac I never even saw before hissed me into the bushes. 1961 November 10, Joseph Heller, “The Soldier in White”, in Catch-22 […], New York, N.Y.: Simon and Schuster, →OCLC, page 172:
(intransitive, transitive) To condemn or express contempt (for someone or something) by hissing.
The merchants among the people shall hiss at thee […] 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Ezekiel 27:36:
If the tag-rag people did not clap him and hiss him, according as he pleased and displeased them, as they use to do the players in the theatre, I am no true man. 1599 (first performance), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Iulius Cæsar”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii]:
How well I remember, her stepmother told her, the days when we Wagnerians used to hiss old Brahms—O for the rapturous rebellious days of youth. 1961, Walker Percy, The Moviegoer, New York: Ivy Books, published 1988, Part 1, Chapter 4, p. 38:
The Play, perhaps, has many things amiss:
Well, let us then reduce the point to this,
Let only those that have no failings, hiss. 1793, Elizabeth Inchbald, Every One Has His Fault, London: G.G.J. and J. Robinson, Prologue:
VVherefore this Religious affection vvhich nature has implanted, and as ſtrongly rooted in Man as the feare of death or the love of vvomen, vvould be the moſt enormous ſlip or bungle ſhe could commit, ſo that ſhe vvould ſo ſhamefully faile in the laſt Act, in this contrivance of the nature of Man, that inſtead of a Plaudite ſhe vvould deſerve to be hiſſed off the Stage. 1653, Henry More, chapter XII, in An Antidote against Atheisme, or An Appeal to the Natural Faculties of the Minde of Man, whether There Be Not a God, London: […] Roger Daniel, […], →OCLC, book II, page 102:
The crowd booed and hissed her off the stage.
As the culprits went through the town and plantations they were laughed at, hissed, and hooted by the slaves […] 1803, Robert Charles Dallas, The History of the Maroons, London: Longman and Rees, Volume 1, Letter 5, p. 145:
(transitive) To utter (something) with a hissing sound.
It turns out that the driver of the red Ferrari that caused the crash wasn't, as I first guessed, a youngster, but a 60-year-old. Clearly, he had energy to spare, which was more than could be said about a panel I listened to around the same time as the crash. Indeed, someone hissed in my ear during a First Magazine awards ceremony in London's imposing Marlborough House on 7 December: "What we need is more old white men on the stage." 2011 December 14, John Elkington, “John Elkington”, in The Guardian:
2012, Hilary Mantel, Bring Up the Bodies, New York: Henry Holt, Part 2, “Master of Phantoms,”
All day from the queen’s rooms, shouting, slamming doors, running feet: hissed conversations in undertones.
the long-necked geese of the world that are ever hissing dispraise […] 1855, Alfred Tennyson, “Maud”, in Maud, and Other Poems, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 20:
Lies oft o’erthrown with ceaseless Venom spread,
Still hiss out Scandal from their Hydra Head, 1761, Robert Lloyd, An Epistle to C. Churchill, London: William Flexney, page 7:
(intransitive) To move with a hissing sound.
The arrow hissed through the air.
Ennis del Mar wakes before five, wind rocking the trailer, hissing in around the aluminum door and window frames. 1997, Annie Proulx, “Brokeback Mountain”, in Close Range: Brokeback Mountain and Other Stories, London: Harper Perennial, published 2005, page 283:
All the preceding afternoon and night heavy thunderstorms had hissed down upon the meads, and washed some of the hay into the river […] 1891, Thomas Hardy, chapter XXIII, in Tess of the d’Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented […], volume II, London: James R[ipley] Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., […], →OCLC, phase the third (The Rally), page 20:
The Troops of Troy recede with sudden Fear,
While the swift Javelin hiss’d along in Air. 1718, Alexander Pope, transl., The Iliad of Homer, London: Bernard Lintott, Volume 4, Book 15, lines 690-691, p. 192:
All shod with steel
We hissed along the polished ice […] 1815, William Wordsworth, “Influence of Natural Objects”, in Poems by William Wordsworth, volume 1, London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, page 46:
(transitive) To emit or eject (something) with a hissing sound.
He hissed air intently through a gap in his upper teeth. 1976, Ira Levin, The Boys from Brazil, New York: Dell, published 1977, Part 1, p. 16:
The man in white pyjamas hissed soda into his glass. 1938, Graham Greene, Brighton Rock, London: Heinemann, Part 2, Chapter 1, p. 72:
The radiator bubbled and hissed steam. 1939, John Steinbeck, chapter 26, in The Grapes of Wrath, New York: Viking, page 500:
(transitive) To whisper, especially angrily or urgently.
"Oh please," she said, "don't let him see us!" I wouldn't let her push me away. "Stop!" she hissed. "He'll see us!" 1968, James A. Emanuel, Theodore L. Gross, Dark symphony, →ISBN:
"Are you quite sure of it," she hissed into his ear, "Mr Fang, Junior?" 1881, Elim Henry D'Avigdor, Across Country, Bradbury, Agnew:
grc συρίζω (to make a hissing sound) · pt silvar (to make a hissing sound) · hu lehurrog (to condemn or express contempt (for someone or something) by hissing) · ta சீறு (to make a hissing sound) · bg съскам (to make a hissing sound) · izh sihissä (to make a hissing sound) · cmn 噝 /咝 (to make a hissing sound) · is hvæsa (to make a hissing sound) · ms mendesis (to make a hissing sound) · it sibilare (to make a hissing sound) · hu sivít (to make a hissing sound) · it soffiare (to make a hissing sound) · eo sibli (to make a hissing sound) · nl sissen (to make a hissing sound) · mi hihī (to make a hissing sound) · no hvese (to make a hissing sound) · tl humigishis (to make a hissing sound) · hu fütyül (to make a hissing sound) · hu sistereg (to make a hissing sound) · ar هَسَّ (to make a hissing sound) · mi ihi (to make a hissing sound) · nl blazen (to make a hissing sound) · ja シッと音を立てる (to make a hissing sound) · cmn 嘶 (to make a hissing sound) · hu suhog (to make a hissing sound) · de zischen (to make a hissing sound) · cmn 嘯 /啸 (to make a hissing sound) · fr siffler (to make a hissing sound) · cs syčet (to make a hissing sound) · ga sios (to make a hissing sound) · hu pisszeg (to make a hissing sound) · fi sähistä (to make a hissing sound) · la sibilo (to make a hissing sound) · ca bufar (to make a hissing sound) · gl asubiar (to make a hissing sound) · hu pfujol (to condemn or express contempt (for someone or something) by hissing) · gl bufar (to make a hissing sound) · id berdesis (to make a hissing sound) · hu sustorog (to make a hissing sound) · arz هَسَّ (to make a hissing sound) · id mendesis (to make a hissing sound) · da hvæse (to make a hissing sound) · fi sihistä (to make a hissing sound) · grc ἐκκρούω (to condemn or express contempt (for someone or something) by hissing) · mpi swe (to make a hissing sound) · ca rebufar (to make a hissing sound) · sv fräsa (to make a hissing sound) · ja シッという (to make a hissing sound) · sk syčať (to make a hissing sound) · cs syknout (to make a hissing sound) · cs zasyčet (to make a hissing sound) · hu sziszeg (to make a hissing sound) · hu süvít (to make a hissing sound) · hu csendre int (to make a hissing sound) · hu sípol (to make a hissing sound) · hu abcúgol (to condemn or express contempt (for someone or something) by hissing) · uk шипіти (to make a hissing sound) · ar هَفَّ (to make a hissing sound) · io sisar (to make a hissing sound) · tr tıslamak (to make a hissing sound) · ru шипе́ть (to make a hissing sound) · scn affutari (to make a hissing sound) · it fischiare (to make a hissing sound) · ro șuiera (to make a hissing sound) · ca xiular (to make a hissing sound) · pt sibilar (to make a hissing sound) · hu kifütyül (to condemn or express contempt (for someone or something) by hissing) · mi whakahihī (to make a hissing sound) · te బుసకొట్టు (to make a hissing sound) · pl syczeć (to make a hissing sound) · hy ֆշշալ (to make a hissing sound) · es sisear (to make a hissing sound) · de fauchen (to make a hissing sound) · is hvissa (to make a hissing sound) · ar فَحَّ (to make a hissing sound) · gl bisbar (to make a hissing sound) · la strīdō (to make a hissing sound)