mew

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See also: Mew

English[edit]

Pronunciation[edit]

Etymology 1[edit]

From Middle English mewe, mowe, meau, from Old English mǣw, from Proto-West Germanic *maiwī, from Proto-Germanic *mai(h)waz (“seagull”). See also West Frisian meau, miuw, Dutch meeuw, German Möwe; akin to Latvian maût (“to roar”), Old Church Slavonic мꙑꙗти (myjati, “to mew”).

Noun[edit]

mew (plural mews)

  1. (archaic, poetic, dialectal) A gull, seagull.
    • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto XII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:
      A daungerous and detestable place, / To which nor fish nor fowle did once approch, / But yelling Meawes, with Seagulles hoarse and bace […]
    • 1954, J. R. R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring:
      From helm to sea they saw him leap, / As arrow from the string, / And dive into the water deep, / As mew upon the wing.
Derived terms[edit]
Translations[edit]

Etymology 2[edit]

From Middle English mewe, mue, mwe, from Anglo-Norman mue, muwe, and Middle French mue (“shedding feathers; cage for moulting birds; prison”), from muer (“to moult”).

Noun[edit]

mew (plural mews)

  1. (obsolete) A prison, or other place of confinement.
  2. (obsolete) A hiding place; a secret store or den.
  3. (obsolete) A breeding-cage for birds.
  4. (falconry) A cage for hawks, especially while moulting.
    • 1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Printed by John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC:
      A horse in a stable that never travels, a hawk in a mew that seldom flies, are both subject to diseases; which, left unto themselves, are most free from any such encumbrances.
  5. (falconry, in the plural) A building or set of buildings where moulting birds are kept.

Verb[edit]

mew (third-person singular simple present mews, present participle mewing, simple past and past participle mewed)

  1. (archaic) To shut away, confine, lock up.
    • c. 1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Richard the Third: […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i]:
      More pity that the eagle should be mew’d,
      While kites and buzzards prey at liberty.
    • c. 1596, John Donne, “Elegie XX: Loves Warre”, in Charles M. Coffin, editor, The Complete Poetry and Selected Prose of John Donne‎[2], New York: Modern Library, page 84:
      To mew me in a Ship, is to inthrall
      Mee in a prison, that weare like to fall;
    • 1693, John Dryden (translator), The Satires of Juvenal, London: Jacob Tonson, Satire 1, p. 10,[3]
      […] Nay some have learn’d the trick
      To beg for absent persons; feign them sick,
      Close mew’d in their Sedans, for fear of air:
    • 1748, Tobias Smollett, chapter 50, in The Adventures of Roderick Random.:
      When it came to his turn to mention Sir John Sparkle, he represented him as a man of an immense estate and narrow disposition, who mewed up his only child, a fine young lady, from the conversation of mankind, under the strict watch and inspection of an old governante, who was either so honest, envious, or insatiable, that nobody had been as yet able to make her a friend, or get access to her charge, though numbers attempted it every day […]
    • 1928, Virginia Woolf, chapter 5, in Orlando: A Biography, London: The Hogarth Press, →OCLC; republished as Orlando: A Biography (eBook no. 0200331h.html), Australia: Project Gutenberg Australia, July 2015:
      […] it was all very well for Orlando to mew herself in her house at Blackfriars and pretend that the climate was the same […]
  2. (of a bird) To moult.
    The hawk mewed his feathers.
  3. (of a bird, obsolete) To cause to moult.
  4. (of a deer, obsolete) To shed antlers.
Alternative forms[edit]
Derived terms[edit]

Etymology 3[edit]

From Middle English mewen; onomatopoeic.

Noun[edit]

mew (plural mews)

  1. The crying sound of a cat; a meow, especially of a kitten.
  2. The crying sound of a gull or buzzard.
  3. (obsolete) An exclamation of disapproval; a boo.
Derived terms[edit]
Translations[edit]
crying sound of a cat — see meow

Verb[edit]

mew (third-person singular simple present mews, present participle mewing, simple past and past participle mewed)

  1. (of a cat, especially of a kitten) To meow.
  2. (of a gull or buzzard) To make its cry.
Translations[edit]
meow — see meow

Interjection[edit]

mew

  1. A cat's (especially a kitten's) cry.
  2. A gull's or buzzard's cry.
  3. (archaic) An exclamation of disapproval; boo.

Etymology 4[edit]

Named after British orthodontists John Mew and his son Michael Mew.[1]

Verb[edit]

mew (third-person singular simple present mews, present participle mewing, simple past and past participle mewed)

  1. (slang, neologism, intransitive) To flatten the tongue against the roof of the mouth for supposed health benefits.

References[edit]

  1. ^ Dream McClinton (2019 March 21) “Mewing: what is the YouTube craze that claims to reshape your face?”, in The Guardian‎[1]

See also[edit]

Anagrams[edit]

Middle English[edit]

Noun[edit]

mew

  1. Alternative form of mewe (“cage”)

Polish[edit]

Pronunciation[edit]

Noun[edit]

mew f

  1. genitive plural of mewa

Yurok[edit]

Pronunciation[edit]

Noun[edit]

mew

  1. widower
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