huff
Part of speech: noun
verb
Morphological type: simple
Etymology: Probably an altered spelling of earlier *hough, represented by Scots hech (“to breathe hard, pant”). Compare also German hauchen (“to breathe”).
Inflected forms:
form: huffs
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: huffs
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: huffing
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: huffed
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: huffed
pos: verb
tags: past
Senses:
gloss: A heavy breath; a grunt or sigh.
pos: noun
examples: With a huff, he lifted the box onto the back of the truck.
gloss: A condition of anger, annoyance, disgust, etc.
pos: noun
tags: figuratively
examples: in a huff
Such wickedness had never come into his head; but he had a certain pleasure in being the confidential friend of a very pretty woman; and when he heard that that pretty woman's husband was jealous, the pleasure was enhanced rather than otherwise. On that Sunday, as he had left the house in Curzon Street, he had told Stanbury that Trevelyan [the husband] had just gone off in a huff, which was true enough, and he had walked from thence down Clarges Street, and across Piccadilly to St. James's Street, with a jauntier step than usual, because he was aware that he himself had been the occasion of that trouble.
Tom Bower’s 2024 book, The House of Beckham, painted a rather snide portrait of the marriage, in which Beckham is constantly surrounded by lovelies, and Victoria is in a constant huff about it.
gloss: One swelled with a false sense of importance or value; a boaster.
pos: noun
tags: obsolete
examples: Lewd, shallow-brained huffs make atheism and contempt of religion the sole badge [...] of wit.
gloss: The act of removing an opponent's piece as a forfeit for deliberately not taking a piece (often signalled by blowing on it).
pos: noun
gloss: To breathe heavily.
pos: verb
tags: intransitive
examples: The run left him huffing and puffing.
gloss: To say in a huffy manner.
pos: verb
tags: intransitive
gloss: To enlarge; to swell up.
pos: verb
tags: intransitive
examples: Bread huffs.
gloss: To bluster or swell with anger, arrogance, or pride; to storm; to take offense.
pos: verb
tags: intransitive
examples: This senseless arrogant conceit of theirs made them huff at the doctrine of repentance.
After all, she huffed, Emily (played by Lily Collins) has been living in the French capital for about a year and had a Champagne brand as her client at the fictional luxury marketing firm, Savoir, where she worked.
gloss: To treat with arrogance and insolence; to chide or rebuke rudely; to bully, to hector.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: […] I was ſent for by the marſhall, huffed and hectored ſtrangely, thretned, &c., in fine, muſte give bonds to the good behaviour; I refuſed, […]
You must not think to huff us.
gloss: To vex; to offend.
pos: verb
tags: archaic
transitive
examples: Signior Riccabocca had become very intimate, as we have seen, at the Parsonage. But not so at the Hall. For though the Squire was inclined to be very friendly to all his neighbours he was, like most country gentlemen, rather easily huffed.
gloss: To inhale psychoactive inhalants.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
gloss: To remove an opponent's piece as a forfeit for deliberately not taking a piece (often signalled by blowing on it).
pos: verb
tags: transitive
Derived words: antihuff
huff and puff
huffcap
huff-cap
huffer
huffish
Hufflepuff
huff off
huff paste
huff-snuff
huffy
in a huff
take huff
Translations: