whimper
/ˈwɪmpə/ noun, verb
Forms whimpers whimpering whimpered
- noun A low intermittent sob.
- verb To cry or sob softly and intermittently. “The lonely puppy began to whimper as soon as we left the room.”
- verb To cry with a low, whining, broken voice; to whine; to complain.
- verb To say something in a whimpering manner. ““Master, please don’t punish me!” he whimpered.”
Synonyms
Etymology
From dialectal whimp (“to whine”) + -er (frequentative suffix). Compare German wimmern (“to whimper, whine”).
Webster’s 1913
- verb To cry with a low, whining, broken voice; to whine; to complain; as, a child whimpers.
- verb To utter in alow, whining tone.
- noun A low, whining, broken cry; a low, whining sound, expressive of complaint or grief.
Etymology [Cf. Scot. whimmer, G. wimmern.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “whimper”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details