hum
Noun pluralhums
Pluralhums
- 1To make a wordless musical sound with the vocal cords while keeping the lips closed.
I hum along whenever that old song comes on the radio.
The toddler hummed quietly until she fell asleep.
Note
At its core the verb takes no object: someone simply hums, and whatever follows is a phrase, as in hum along, hum along with the music, or hum happily. Put a tune directly after the verb and it shifts to its transitive use, where the melody is the thing hummed. In both uses the lips stay closed, and that is what separates humming from singing.
- 2A faint, often unclear sound that resembles a person humming.
A steady hum filled the room from the overhead lights.
The hum of distant traffic drifted through the open window.
Similardrone, buzz, murmur, whir, thrum
Note
Here the hum belongs to things rather than people: a dishwasher left running, overhead lights, an insect in flight. Shakespeare gives the beetle in Macbeth (c. 1606) its "drowsy hums," a plural that counts each drone as its own sound. Everyday English tends to keep the word singular and name the source with of, as in the hum of traffic. The verb behind the insect image is to drone like a flying insect.
- 3A sound used to show that the speaker is thinking over or considering something.
Hum, I hadn't considered that possibility before now.
Hum, perhaps we should look at the figures again.
Similarhmm
Note
A written thinking-noise with a long history: Arthur Conan Doyle's The Sign of Four (1890) has "Hum! hum! What's all this?" It does the work of hmm, and the doubled, exclaimed form shows someone puzzling over what is in front of them. As a single word set off by a comma, it gives a sentence a considering pause before the real thought arrives.
- 4To make a low, continuous droning sound, like the noise flying insects make in motion.
Mosquitoes hum near your ear just as you're falling asleep.
The old machine hummed steadily in the corner of the workshop.
Similarbuzz, drone, whir, whine, purr
Note
Insects are the model here, and writers have favored the bee. Alexander Dow's 1769 translation has "the humming bee, drunk with joy", and Virginia Woolf's Jacob's Room (1922) has "a bee humming at the yellow flower". The participle sits comfortably before a noun, and the verb takes at for whatever the insect hovers over.
- 5A tune produced with the lips closed rather than sung with words.
A cheerful hum escaped her as she stirred the soup.
He recognized the tune from just a few notes of her hum.
Note
The tune-sense sits closest to the word's sound: Middle English hummen, probably imitative, with kin in Dutch hommelen "to bumble, buzz." Middle English hummen could also mean a murmur made to cover embarrassment, a use that echoes in the hesitant "um". You hum a song, and what comes out is a hum. The shellfish hum, meaning blood cockles, is a separate word borrowed from Hokkien.
- 6
- 7To convey a tune or feeling by humming rather than speaking or singing it.
She hummed a few bars of the melody to remind us.
Drivers often hum tunes to stay alert on long trips.
- 8
- 9To be busily active and full of energy, like a buzzing beehive.
Trading floors hum with activity the moment the market opens.
The fairgrounds hummed with life all weekend long.
Similarbuzz, bustle, teem, throb, pulse
Note
The figurative use takes with: a street or an office hums with activity, life or energy. The image comes from the beehive, with sound standing in for busyness, and the progressive is natural, as in the streets were humming. The noun for busy activity carries the same picture in a hum of activity.
- 10A sound used to signal doubt, hesitation, or uncertainty.
Hum, I suppose we could try it your way, though I have my doubts.
When asked for a decision, all he managed was a noncommittal hum.
Similarum
Note
Where the thinking noise marks consideration, this one marks a stumble, and it sits in the middle of a sentence the way um does. Stephen Fry's The Liar (1991) uses it just before a delicate phrase: "They were both, hum, 'put out' themselves." Set off by commas, it shows a speaker hesitating over a word rather than over a decision.
- 11A phenomenon in which many people report a persistent, invasive low-frequency droning or rumbling that is not audible to everyone.
Several neighborhoods reported the same nocturnal hum, yet half the residents heard nothing.
Officials launched a study after dozens of complaints about a low, droning hum.
Note
Used with the definite article, and often in quotation marks: "the hum" names a reported mystery rather than any one sound. Its defining feature is that not everyone hears it. For that reason the word keeps company with reports, theories and unsolved cases, and proposed causes range from farm or factory machinery to flying saucers. Without the article, a hum is just an ordinary faint drone.
- 12A hoax or fraudulent imposition practiced on someone; a piece of humbug.
He dismissed the advertisement as a clever hum designed to part fools from their money.
The promised inheritance proved to be nothing but a hum.
Similarhoax, humbug, sham, fraud, con
Note
A dated word for a hoax and a near-twin of humbug: a hum is a deception passed off on the credulous. It survives mainly in older prose. A modern reader who meets it can safely read it as "a con". The same idea of trickery runs through the verb for cajoling someone, where it becomes something done to a victim.
- 13To cajole or flatter someone in order to deceive or impose upon them.
He tried to hum the old woman into signing the contract.
They hummed the new clerk with false praise until he handed over the keys.
Similarcajole, coax, wheedle, flatter, hoodwink
Note
Here flattery is the means and deceit is the end. The verb is transitive, so someone hums a victim. It is dated British slang, and it pairs with the noun for a hoax the way humbug the verb pairs with humbug the noun. A modern reader is most likely to meet it in older prose, where it means working on someone with praise in order to take advantage of them.
- 14An unpleasant smell given off by something or someone.
There was a terrible hum coming from the back of the fridge.
The changing room had a real hum after the match.
Similarstink, stench, pong, reek, whiff
Oppositefragrance
Note
British slang turns the sound word into a smell word: a hum is a stink that hangs about a place, such as the back of a fridge or a locker room. It belongs to casual speech. In careful writing, smell or odor is the safer choice. The sentence usually has to signal that a smell is meant, because a hum from the fridge could just as easily be a noise.
- 15To reek; to give off a strong, unpleasant smell.
The kitchen bins hum in this heat.
His gym bag was beginning to hum by Friday.
Similarstink, reek, smell, pong
Note
The verb follows the British slang of the noun for a bad smell. Its subject is whatever gives off the smell or the place it fills, so a room, a bin or a gym bag can hum. It takes no object, and really is a natural intensifier, as in this room really hums. Like the noun, it belongs to casual talk.
- 16A kind of strong drink, especially a potent intoxicating liquor.
The sailors called for another round of hum before the storm hit.
you do provide me hum enough , And lour to bouse with
c. 1622, John Fletcher, Philip Massinger [et al.?]Note
A strong drink of the early 1600s that has since left English entirely. Fletcher and Massinger's Beggars Bush (c. 1622) has a character promised "hum enough, and lour to bouse with". Nothing in the line says what the drink was beyond its strength. The word is obsolete: in historical fiction it reads as period color, and in modern speech no one would understand it.
- 17An edible cockle known as the blood cockle or ark clam, served as food.
The hawker served steaming hum with a spicy dip.
Fresh hum is best eaten lightly cooked so the flesh stays tender.
Note
A separate word that only shares the spelling: it is a borrowing from Hokkien 蚶 (ham), meaning the blood cockle or ark clam. It is informal and belongs to the English of Malaysia and Singapore, where it works as a mass noun (a plate of hum, not hums). Elsewhere readers will take it for the sound word, so a mention of a dish or a hawker stall helps.
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Origins
From Middle English hummen ("to hum, buzz, drone"), related to Dutch hommelen ("to bumble, buzz") and Middle High German hummen ("to hum"). It is probably ultimately of imitative origin.
Borrowed from Hokkien 蚶 (ham).