yawn
Plural: yawns
Noun
- an involuntary intake of breath through a wide open mouth; usually triggered by fatigue or boredom
- "he could not suppress a yawn"
- "the yawning in the audience told him it was time to stop"
- The action of yawning; opening the mouth widely and taking a long, rather deep breath, often because one is tired or bored.
- A particularly boring event.
Verb
Verb Forms: yawned, yawning, yawns
- To open the mouth wide and inhale deeply, often from tiredness.
- utter a yawn, as from lack of oxygen or when one is tired
- "The child yawned during the long performance"
- be wide open
- To open the mouth widely and take a long, rather deep breath, often because one is tired or bored, and sometimes accompanied by pandiculation.
- To say while yawning.
- To present a wide opening; gape.
- To open the mouth, or to gape, through surprise or bewilderment.
- To be eager; to desire to swallow anything; to express desire by yawning.
Examples
- Death yawned before us, and I hit the brakes.
- I could see my students yawning, so I knew the lesson was boring them.
- The canyon yawns as it has done for millions of years, and we stand looking, dumbstruck.
- The slideshow we sat through was such a yawn. I was glad when it finished.
- to yawn for fat livings
- Watching my opponent take forever to choose a word made me YAWN with boredom.
Origin / 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)
Scrabble Score: 10
yawn: valid Scrabble (US) TWL Wordyawn: valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
yawn: valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary