yawn
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: enpr: yôn
ipa: /jɔːn/
enpr: yôn
ipa: /jɔn/
enpr: yän
ipa: /jɑn/
ipa: /joːn/
homophone: yon (cot–caught merger)
rhymes: -ɔːn
Forms: form: yawns
form: yawning
form: yawned
form: yawned
Etymology: Partly from Middle English yanen, yonen, yenen (“to yawn”), from Old English ġeonian, ġinian (“to yawn, gape”), from Proto-West Germanic *ginōn, from Proto-Germanic *ginōną (“to yawn”); and partly from Middle English gonen (“to gape, yawn”), from Old English gānian (“to yawn, gape”), from Proto-West Germanic *gainōn, from Proto-Germanic *gainōną (“to yawn, gape”); both from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰi-, *ǵʰeyh₁- (“to yawn, gape”).
Cognate with North Frisian jåne (“to yawn”), Saterland Frisian jaanje, joanje (“to yawn”), Middle Dutch genen, ghenen (“to yawn”), German Low German jahnen (“to yawn”), German gähnen (“to yawn, gape”), dialectal Swedish gana (“to gape, gawk”), dialectal Norwegian gina (“to gape”).
Compare also Old Church Slavonic зѣѭ (zějǫ) (Russian зи́нуть (zínutʹ), зия́ть (zijátʹ)), Greek χαίνω (khaínō)), Latin hiō, Tocharian A śew, Tocharian B kāyā, Lithuanian žioti, Sanskrit जेह् (jeh)
Senses: examples: text: I could see my students yawning, so I knew the lesson was boring them.
text: […] I found my self towards Evening, first empty and sickish at my Stomach, and nearer Night mightily enclin’d to yawning and sleepy […]
ref: 1719, [Daniel Defoe], The Farther Adventures of Robinson Crusoe; […], London: […] W[illiam] Taylor […], →OCLC:
text: c. 1773, John Trumbull, The Progress of Dulness, Exeter, New Hampshire: Henry Ranlet, 1794, Part 1, p. 19,
And while above he spends his breath,
The yawning audience nod beneath.
glosses: To open the mouth widely and take a long, rather deep breath, often because one is tired or bored, and sometimes accompanied by pandiculation.
examples: text: “I haven’t the least idea what I want to do,” he yawned.
ref: 1922, Stephen McKenna, chapter 10, in The Secret Victory, New York: George H. Doran, page 214:
text: “Oh,” Sutherland yawned, “I’m too old for this.”
ref: 1978, Andrew Holleran, chapter 8, in The Dancer from the Dance, New York: Bantam, published 1979, page 217:
glosses: To say while yawning.
examples: text: The canyon yawns as it has done for millions of years, and we stand looking, dumbstruck.
text: Death yawned before us, and I hit the brakes.
text: ’Tis now the very witching time of night,
When churchyards yawn, and hell itself breathes out
Contagion to this world.
ref: c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene ii]:
text: […] Hell at last
Yawning receavd them whole, and on them clos’d,
ref: 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 874-875:
text: If your child has tumbled into one of those open sewers which yawn for the unwary in the streets […]
ref: 1911, James George Frazer, The Golden Bough, volume 8, page 104:
glosses: To present a wide opening; gape.
examples: text: […] O heavy hour!
Methinks it should be now a huge eclipse
Of sun and moon, and that the affrighted globe
Should yawn at alteration.
ref: c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii]:
text: […] Hell being vnder euerie one of their Stages, the Players (if they had owed him a spight) might with a false Trappe doore haue slipt him downe, and there kept him, as a laughing stocke to al their yawning Spectators.
ref: 1606, Thomas Dekker, Nevves from hell brought by the Diuells carrier, London: W. Ferebrand:
glosses: To open the mouth, or to gape, through surprise or bewilderment.
examples: text: to yawn for fat livings
text: Fly not, as thou wert wont, to his embrace,
Lest, after one long yawning gaze, he swear
Thou art the best good fellow in the world,
But he had quite forgotten thee, by Jove!
ref: 1824, Walter Savage Landor, “Milton and Andrew Marvel”, in Imaginary Conversations of Literary Men and Statesmen, volume I, London: […] Taylor and Hessey, […], →OCLC, page 6:
glosses: To be eager; to desire to swallow anything; to express desire by yawning.
Derived terms: yawnable
yawner
yawningly