Klryz
Pronunciation guide: IPA symbols, stress and word endings

Vowels

iːseeɪsite / ɛbedæcat
ɑːfatherɒhot (UK)ɔːlawʊput
uːtooʌcupɜːbirdəabout
eɪdayaɪmyɔɪboyaʊnow
əʊ / oʊgo (UK / US)ɪəneareəhairʊətour

Consonants that look unusual

θthinðthisʃsheʒmeasure
tʃchurchdʒjudgeŋsingjyes

p b t d k g f v s z h m n l r w sound as in ordinary English spelling.

Marks

  • ˈ main stress, before the stressed syllable: /ˈwɔːtə/ water · ˌ lighter (secondary) stress: /ˌʌndəˈstænd/ understand
  • ː a long vowel · (r) an r said only in accents that pronounce it (most American, Scottish, Irish)

Common word endings

  • -s / -es (plurals; he/she form of verbs): /s/ after voiceless sounds (cats), /z/ after voiced (dogs), /ɪz/ after s, z, sh, ch, j sounds (buses, watches). Spelling: -es after s, x, z, ch, sh; consonant + y → -ies (city → cities).
  • -ed (past): /t/ after voiceless sounds (walked), /d/ after voiced (played), /ɪd/ after t or d (wanted). Spelling: love → loved, stop → stopped, carry → carried.
  • -ing: make → making, run → running, see → seeing.
  • Irregular: go, went, gone · be, was, been · see, saw, seen · man → men · child → children · mouse → mice.
  • Older (King James) forms: -eth = -s (he loveth = he loves) · -est with “thou” (thou lovest) · spake = spoke.

English Dictionary · 107,383 entries · Sources & licences

whistle

/ˈwɪs(ə)l/ noun, verb

Forms whistles whistling whistled

  1. noun A device designed to be placed in the mouth and blown, or driven by steam or some other mechanism, to make a whistling sound.
  2. noun An act of whistling.
  3. noun A shrill, high-pitched sound made by whistling.
  4. noun Any high-pitched sound similar to the sound made by whistling.
  5. noun (Cockney rhyming slang) A suit (from whistle and flute).
  6. noun (colloquial) The mouth and throat; so called as being the organs of whistling.
  7. verb (ambitransitive) To make a shrill, high-pitched sound by forcing air through the mouth. To produce a whistling sound, restrictions to the flow of air are created using the teeth, tongue and lips. “Never whistle at a funeral.”
  8. verb (ambitransitive) To make a similar sound by forcing air through a musical instrument or a pipe etc. “The steam train whistled as it passed by.”
  9. verb (intransitive) To move in such a way as to create a whistling sound. “A bullet whistled past.”
  10. verb (transitive) To send, signal, or call by a whistle.
  11. verb (intransitive, Opus Dei, slang) To request admission to Opus Dei, a Roman Catholic organization.

Synonyms

whistling pennywhistle tin whistle sing

Etymology

From Middle English whistel, whistil, whistle, from Old English hwistle, from the verb (see below).

From Middle English whistlen, from Old English hwistlan, hwistlian (“to whistle”), from Proto-West Germanic *hwistlōn, from Proto-Germanic *hwistlōną (“to make a hissing sound”). Cognate with Swedish vissla (“to whistle”), Icelandic hvísla (“to whisper”), Russian свистеть (svistetʹ, “to whistle”).

Webster’s 1913

  1. verb To make a kind of musical sound, or series of sounds, by forcing the breath through a small orifice formed by contracting the lips; also, to emit a similar sound, or series of notes, from the mouth or beak, as birds.
  2. verb To make a shrill sound with a wind or steam instrument, somewhat like that made with the lips; to blow a sharp, shrill tone.
  3. verb To form, utter, or modulate by whistling; as, to whistle a tune or an air.
  4. verb To send, signal, or call by a whistle.

Etymology [AS. hwistlian; akin to Sw. hvissla, Dan. hvisle, Icel. hvisla to whisper, and E. whisper. Whisper.]

Etymology [AS. hwistle a pipe, flute, whistle. See Whistle, v. i.]

Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “whistle”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details

Sanskrit

Sanskrit dictionary entries whose meaning includes “whistle” (best matches first).