YAWN • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Yawn

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/jɔn/ Listen

noun

Yawn n.

An involuntary act, excited by drowsiness, etc., consisting of a deep and long inspiration following several successive attempts at inspiration, the mouth, fauces, etc., being wide open. "One person yawning in company will produce a spontaneous yawn in all present."

The act of opening wide, or of gaping.

A chasm, mouth, or passageway. (R.) "Now gape the graves, and trough their yawns let loose Imprisoned spirits."

verb

Yawn v. i. (past & past part. yawned; pres. part. yawning)

To open the mouth involuntarily through drowsiness, dullness, or fatigue; to gape; to oscitate. "The lazy, yawning drone." "And while above he spends his breath, The yawning audience nod beneath."

To open wide; to gape, as if to allow the entrance or exit of anything. "'t is now the very witching time of night, When churchyards yawn."

To open the mouth, or to gape, through surprise or bewilderment.

To be eager; to desire to swallow anything; to express desire by yawning; as, to yawn for fat livings. "One long, yawning gaze."

See images of 'Yawn'

Etymology of 'Yawn'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

"Yawn" Quotes from Famous Books

... Newhall, with a sepulchral yawn; "Sunday has come at last, and I am glad. It is called a day of rest, but is no day of rest for me. I have a thousand things to do this forenoon; one hour has passed away already, and I don't know ...

— Jack in the Forecastle • John Sherburne Sleeper

... under a strong blue sky, Turnbull got up out of the grass and fern in which he had been lying, and his still intermittent laughter ended in a kind of yawn. ...

— The Ball and The Cross • G.K. Chesterton

... suited for that kind of life? Can you picture me devoting myself to the keeping of a house tidy, the overseeing of meals? I fancy I see myself spending the long, quiet evenings, my husband busy in his office or out among his patients while I dose and yawn and grow fat and old and ugly, and the great world forgetting. Dick, I should die! Of course, I love Barney. But I must have life, movement. I ...

— The Doctor - A Tale Of The Rockies • Ralph Connor

... adversaries. The triumph comes with time, and the turbulent waves of controversy recede into gentle ripples of approval. And for many a cause for which men have suffered and died, posterity has but a yawn. "Just think of it—all that fuss and all that ...

— Mountain Meditations - and some subjects of the day and the war • L. Lind-af-Hageby

... witching time of night, When churchyards yawn, and hell itself breathes out Contagion to this world: Now could I drink hot blood, And do such bitter business[106] as the day Would quake to look on. Soft! now to my mother. O, heart, lose not thy nature; let not ever The soul of Nero enter this firm bosom: Let me be cruel, not unnatural; ...

— Hamlet • William Shakespeare

More quotes...