whist
noun
- card game
interjection
No English definition recorded for this entry.
L334109 on Wikidata ↗Wiktionary
Pronunciation: /ˈwɪst/ / /ˈʍɪst/ / [ˈw̥ɪst]
adj
Etymology: From Middle English whist (“silent”), possibly onomatopoeic.
- Silent, hushed.
“Come unto these yellow sands, / And then take hands: / Courtsied when you have and kiss'd / The wild waves whist, / Foot it featly here and there; / And, sweet sprites, the burthen bear.[…]”
intj
Etymology: From Middle English whist (“silent”), possibly onomatopoeic.
- Alternative spelling of whisht. Silence!, quiet!, hush!, shhh!, shush!
“… for scarcely had they descended one hundred feet, when a low “whist” from the girl, warned them of present danger.”
- Onomatopoeia for slicing.
“Well! she laid down her little golden head without fear; and whist! down came the axe, and it was off. So the mother wiped the axe and laughed.”
noun
Etymology: Alteration of whisk, perhaps so called from the notion of “whisking” up cards after each trick. Altered perhaps on assumption that the word was an interjection invoking silence, by influence of whist (“silent”).
- Any of several four-player card games, similar to bridge.
- A session of playing this card game.
verb
Etymology: From Middle English whist (“silent”), possibly onomatopoeic.
- To hush or shush; to still.
“o was the Titaness put downe and whist”
- To become silent.
“The fields whist, beasts, and fowls of divers bue”