FromMiddle English coughen ,coghen ( “ to cough; to vomit ” ) [ and other forms ] , fromOld English *cohhian (compareOld English cohhetan ( “ to bluster; to riot; to cough (?) ” ) ), fromProto-West Germanic *kuh- ( “ to cough ” ) , ultimately ofonomatopoeic origin.[ 1]
cough (third-person singular simple present coughs ,present participle coughing ,simple past and past participle coughed )
( transitive , medicine ) Sometimes followed by up : toforce (something) out of thelungs orthroat bypushing air from the lungs through theglottis (causing ashort ,explosive sound ), and out through themouth .Sometimes shecoughed up blood.
1923 May 17,P[elham] G[renville] Wodehouse , “The Great Sermon Handicap”, inThe Inimitable Jeeves , Harmondsworth, Middlesex[ London] :Penguin Books , published1979 ,→ISBN ,page139 :Jeevescoughed one soft, low, gentle cough like a sheep with a blade of grass stuck in its throat, and then stood gazing serenely at the landscape.
Tocause (oneself or something) to be in acertain condition in themanner described insense 1.1 .He almostcoughed himself into a fit.
Toexpress (words , etc.) in the manner described insense 1.1 .1785 ,William Cowper , “Book IV. The Winter Evening.”, inThe Task, a Poem, [ … ] , London: [ … ] J[ oseph] Johnson ; [ … ] ,→OCLC ,pages144–145 :No ſtationary ſteeds /Cough their ovvn knell, vvhile heedleſs of the ſound / The ſilent circle fan themſelves, and quake.
( figurative ) Tosurrender (information ); toconfess . ( originally US , slang ) Chiefly followed by up : togive up orhand over (something); especially, topay up (money ).1909 April,O. Henry [pseudonym; William Sydney Porter], “Whistling Dick’s Christmas Stocking”, inRoads of Destiny , Garden City, N.Y.:Doubleday, Page & Company ,→OCLC ,page324 :By the time you get back the men will all be striking out for the fire, and we'll break for the house and collar the dollars. Everybodycough up what matches he's got.
1929 March–August,P[elham] G[renville] Wodehouse , “A Job for Percy Pilbeam”, inSummer Lightning , 1st UK edition, London:Herbert Jenkins [ … ] , published19 July 1929 ,→OCLC , section II,page148 :"Parsloe, will you or will you notcough up that pig?" / "I have not got your pig."
( intransitive ) To push air from the lungs through the glottis (causing a short, explosive sound) and out through the mouth, usually toexpel somethingblocking orirritating theairway .I breathed in a lungful of smoke by mistake, and started tocough .
1577 ,Martial , “Epigrammes out of Martial.[ To Parthenope.] ”, in Timothe Kendall, transl.,Flowers of Epigrammes [ … ] ,[ Manchester] : [ … ] [ Charles Simms] for the Spenser Society, published1874 ,→OCLC ,pages56–57 :Yet notwithſtandyng all this geare, / thoucougheſt ſtill, perdy / Ye are a craftie knaue, youcough / to fare deliciouſly.
c. 1603–1604 (date written) ,William Shakespeare ,The Tragœdy of Othello, the Moore of Venice. [ … ] (First Quarto), London: [ … ] N[ icholas] O[ kes] forThomas Walkley , [ … ] , published1622 ,→OCLC ,[ Act IV, scene ii] ,page70 :Leave procreants alone, and ſhut the dore, /Coffe , or cry hem, if any body come,[ …]
1828 May 15, [Walter Scott ], chapter X, inChronicles of the Canongate. Second Series. [ … ] (The Fair Maid of Perth ), volume III, Edinburgh: [ … ] [Ballantyne and Co. ] forCadell and Co. ; London:Simpkin and Marshall ,→OCLC ,page259 :"Did your lordship's servant see Simon Glover and his daughter?" said Henry, struggling for breath, andcoughing , to conceal from the Provost the excess of his agitation.
1835 January 23 (date written), Frederic James Post, “A Discourse Touching Rides and Riding”, inExtracts from the Diary and Other Manuscripts of the Late Frederic James Post, of Islington. [ … ] , London: [ … ] [ James Moyes] for private circulation, published1838 ,→OCLC ,pages331–332 :But often, when thy face [i.e. , that of a horse] is turnedfrom the stable, thou hast an unaccountable desire to place it in the position occupied by thy tail: thou stoppest,coughest , shyest, and erst, with swift detorsion, turnest round, then, with sidelong glance of my magic caduceus, ominously wagging between the horizon and thy ample sides, I incite thee on, but rarely does thy pace more than trot,from home.
[[ 1840] , A[ ngelo] Renzi, “Verbi. Verbes. Verbs.”, inLe polyglotte improvisé, ou l’art d’écrire les langues sans les appendre. [ … ] [The Improvised Polyglot, or The Art of Writing Languages without Learning Them. [ … ] ], Paris: Chez l‘auteur, [ … ] ; Chez Baudry, [ … ] , et Chez les Principaux Libraries,→OCLC ,page498 : Tossivi / Tu tossais / Thoucoughedst ]
1869 May, Anthony Trollope, “Trevelyan Discourses on Life”, inHe Knew He Was Right , volume II, London: Strahan and Company, [ … ] ,→OCLC ,page336 :After this he fell a-coughing violently, and Stanbury thought it better to leave him.
Tomake anoise like acough .The enginecoughed and sputtered.
1884 December 10,Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter XIX, inThe Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: (Tom Sawyer’s Comrade) [ … ] , London:Chatto & Windus , [ … ] ,→OCLC ,pages169–170 :Wake up, by-and-by, and look to see what done it, and maybe see a steamboat,coughing along up stream, so far off towards the other side you couldn't tell nothing about her only whether she was stern-wheel or side-wheel; then for about an hour there wouldn't be nothing to hear nor nothing to see—just solid lonesomeness.
( originally US , slang ) To surrender information; to confess, tospill the beans .to force (something) out of the lungs or throat by pushing air from the lungs through the glottis (causing a short, explosive sound), and out through the mouth
to cause (oneself or something) to be in a certain condition in the manner specified in sense 1.1
to express (words, etc.) in the manner specified in sense 1.1
(
transitive ) to surrender (information); (
intransitive ) to surrender information
—see confess to push air from the lungs through the glottis (causing a short, explosive sound) and out through the mouth
Abkhaz:please add this translation if you can Acehnese:batôk Adyghe:please add this translation if you can Afrikaans:hoes Aghwan:please add this translation if you can Ainu:please add this translation if you can Albanian:kollitem (sq) Arabic:سَعَلَ ( saʕala ) Egyptian Arabic:كاح ( kāḥ ) Moroccan Arabic:كح ( kaḥḥ ) ,كحب ( kḥab ) ,سعل ( sʕal ) Armenian:հազալ (hy) ( hazal ) Aromanian:tushescu ,tushedzu Assamese:কাহা ( kaha ) ( Central Assamese ) ,কহা ( koha ) Assyrian Neo-Aramaic:ܫܵܥܹܠ ( šāˁēl ) Asturian:tusir Azerbaijani:öskürmək (az) Bahnar:hiĕn Bashkir:йүткереү ( yütkerew ) Basque:eztul egin Belarusian:ка́шляць impf ( kášljacʹ ) ,кашляну́ць pf ( kašljanúcʹ ) Bengali:কাশা (bn) ( kaśa ) Biatah Bidayuh:ŭkŭd Bikol Central:abo (bcl) Bulgarian:ка́шлям impf ( kášljam ) Burmese:ချောင်းဆိုး (my) ( hkyaung:hcui: ) Catalan:tossir (ca) Cebuano:ubo Chakma:please add this translation if you can Chepang:स्युप् Chinese:Cantonese:咳 ( kat1 ) Mandarin:咳嗽 (zh) ( késou ) Choctaw:hotilhko Chuvash:ӳсӗр ( üs̬ĕr ) Czech:kašlat (cs) impf Danish:hoste (da) Drung:saq dvmat Dutch:hoesten (nl) ,kuchen (nl) Eastern Cham:ꨚꨓꨭꩀ ( patuk ) Esperanto:tusi Estonian:köhatama Extremaduran:tusil Faroese:hosta Finnish:köhiä (fi) ,yskiä (fi) French:tousser (fr) Friulian:tossi Galician:tusir (gl) Georgian:დახველება ( daxveleba ) ,ხველა ( xvela ) German:husten (de) Alemannic German:bëcke Greek:βήχω (el) ( vícho ) Ancient:βήσσω ( bḗssō ) Hawaiian:kunu Hebrew:השתעל (he) ( hishta'él ) Hiligaynon:obo Hindi:खांसना ( khānsnā ) ,खाँसना ( khā̃snā ) ,खाँसी (hi) ( khā̃sī ) Hungarian:köhög (hu) Icelandic:hósta (is) Ido:tusar (io) Ifè:wúkɔ́ Igbo:kwa ụkwarà Ilocano:aguyek Indonesian:batuk (id) Ingrian:köhhiä Inupiaq:quqhiq- Irish:bí ag casacht ,déan casacht Italian:tossire (it) Iu Mien:hnopv Japanese:咳 をする ( せきをする, seki o suru ) Javanese:watuk (jv) Jeju:지침ᄒᆞ다 ( jichimhawda ) Kannada:ಕೆಮ್ಮು (kn) ( kemmu ) Kapampangan:uku ,kuku Kazakh:жөтелу ( jötelu ) Khmer:ក្អក (km) ( kʼɑɑk ) Kinaray-a:ubo Kituba:kosola ,kukosola Korean:기침하다 ( gichimhada ) Kurdish:Central Kurdish:please add this translation if you can Northern Kurdish:kuxîn (ku) Kyrgyz:жөтөлүү ( jötölüü ) Lao:ໄອ ( ʼai ) Latgalian:kuosēt Latin:tussiō Latvian:kāsēt ,klepot Lingala:kosola Lithuanian:kosėti Lolopo:zil Lü:ᦺᦀ ( ˙ʼay ) Louisiana Creole:tousé Luxembourgish:houschten Macedonian:ка́шла impf ( kášla ) Malay:batuk (ms) Manchu:ᡶᡠᠴᡳᡥᡳᠶᠠᠮᠪᡳ ( fucihiyambi ) Mongolian:ханиах (mn) ( xaniax ) Muak Sa-aak:kʰua¹ Nahuatl:tlatlaci Nepali:खोक्नु ( khoknu ) Norman:toûtre ( Jersey ) Norwegian:Bokmål:hoste (no) Nynorsk:hosta ,hoste Nuosu:ꊫ ( zyp ) Occitan:tossir (oc) Odia:ଖାସିବା (or) ( khāsibā ) Old English:hwōsan Oromo:qufa'uu Pacoh:cahóq ,carhoq ,nghoq Pangasinan:okok Pennsylvania German:huuschde Persian:کهیدن ( kohidan ) ,سرفیدن (fa) ( sorfidan ) ,سرفه کردن (fa) ( sorfe kardan ) Polish:kaszleć (pl) ,kaszlnąć (pl) pf Portuguese:tossir (pt) Punjabi:ਖੰਘਣਾ ( khaṅghṇā ) Quechua:uhuy Rapa Nui:tumu Rohingya:hañc Romanian:tuși (ro) Romansch:tosser ,tuoscher ,tuossir ,tusser ,tussir Russian:ка́шлять (ru) impf ( kášljatʹ ) ,кашляну́ть (ru) pf ( kašljanútʹ ) Sanskrit:कासते (sa) ( kāsate ) Sardinian:tuscire ,tussire ,tussiri Scots:coch Scottish Gaelic:dèan casad Serbo-Croatian:Cyrillic:ка̀шљати impf Roman:kàšljati (sh) impf Shan:ဢႆ (shn) ( ʼǎi ) Slovak:kašľať impf Slovene:kašljati (sl) impf Somali:qufacid Southern Altai:јӧдӱлдеер ( ǰödüldeer ) ,јӧткӱрер ( ǰötkürer ) Spanish:toser (es) Swahili:-kohoa Swedish:hosta (sv) Tagalog:umubo Tai Dam:ꪼꪮ Tai Nüa:please add this translation if you can Tajik:сулфидан (tg) ( sulfidan ) Tamil:இருமு (ta) ( irumu ) Tatar:ютәлләү ( yutälläw ) Telugu:దగ్గు (te) ( daggu ) Thai:ไอ (th) ( ai ) Tibetan:གློ་བརྒྱབ ( glo brgyab ) ,གློ་གྱག ( glo gyag ) ,གློ་འཁོགས་པ ( glo 'khogs pa ) Turkish:öksürmek (tr) Turkmen:üsgürmek Tày:ay Ukrainian:ка́шляти impf ( kášljaty ) ,кашляну́ти pf ( kašljanúty ) Urdu:کھانسنا ( khānsnā ) Uyghur:يۆتەلمەك ( yötelmek ) Uzbek:yoʻtalmoq (uz) Venetan:tosar ,toser ,tosir Vietnamese:ho (vi) Volapük:kögön (vo) Walloon:tossî (wa) Welsh:pesychu (cy) West Coast Bajau:please add this translation if you can White Hmong:hnoos Wolof:please add this translation if you can Yámana:please add this translation if you can Yiddish:הוסטן ( hustn ) Yoruba:húkọ́ Yucatec Maya:please add this translation if you can Yup'ik:please add this translation if you can Zazaki:kığayen ,kığen ,kuğen Zhuang:ae Zulu:please add this translation if you can
to make a noise like a cough
Thenoun is derived fromMiddle English cough ( “ a cough; illness causing coughing ” ) [ and other forms ] ,[ 2] fromcoughen ( verb ) : seeetymology 1 .[ 3]
Theinterjection is probably derived from the noun.
cough (plural coughs )
Example A series of three coughs(nounsense 1 ) .
Asudden , ofteninvoluntary expulsion ofair from thelungs through theglottis (causing ashort ,explosive sound ), and out through themouth .Behind me, I heard a distinct, drycough .
1640 ,John Parkinson , “Cyperus dulcis rotundus esculentus, Trasi dulce vocatus. The Most Delicate Sweet Cyperus, or Rush Nut.”, inTheatrum Botanicum: The Theater of Plants. Or, An Herball of a Large Extent: [ … ] , London: [ … ] Tho[ mas] Cotes ,→OCLC ,page148 :[I]t conduceth helpe to the crudities, humidities, and vvindineſſe of the ſtomacke and belly, and to helpe the ſhortneſſe of breath andcoughes :[ …]
1709 ,Alexander Pope , “January and May; or, The Merchant’s Tale , fromChaucer ”, inThe Works of Mr. Alexander Pope , volume I, London: [ … ] W[ illiam] Bowyer , forBernard Lintot , [ … ] , published1717 ,→OCLC ,page223 :The lumpiſh husband ſnoar'd avvay the night, / Tillcoughs avvak'd him near the morning light.
1918 ,W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell , chapter V, inThe Mirror and the Lamp , Indianapolis, Ind.:The Bobbs-Merrill Company ,→OCLC ,page26 :One saint's day in mid-term a certain newly appointed suffragan-bishop came to the school chapel, and there preached on “The Inner Life.” He at once secured attention by his informal method, and when presently the coughing of Jarvis and another boy interrupted the sermon, he altogether captivated his audience with a remark aboutcough lozenges being cheap and easily procurable. An attributive use. 1923 May 17,P[elham] G[renville] Wodehouse , “The Great Sermon Handicap”, inThe Inimitable Jeeves , Harmondsworth, Middlesex[ London] :Penguin Books , published1979 ,→ISBN ,page139 :Jeeves coughed one soft, low, gentlecough like a sheep with a blade of grass stuck in its throat, and then stood gazing serenely at the landscape.
About ofrepeated coughing (verbsense 2.1 ) ; also, amedical condition that causes one to cough.( medical condition ) : Synonym: tussis Sorry, I can’t come to work today—I’ve got a nastycough .
c. 1596–1599 (date written) ,William Shakespeare ,The Second Part of Henrie the Fourth, [ … ] , quarto edition, London: [ … ] V[ alentine] S[ immes] forAndrew Wise , andWilliam Aspley , published1600 ,→OCLC ,[Act III, scene ii] :[John ]Fal [staff ] . VVhat diſeaſe haſt thou? / [Peter ]Bul [lcaff ]. A horſon cold ſir, acough ſir, vvhich I cought vvith ringing in the Kings affaires vpon his coronation day ſir.1851 June –1852 April ,Harriet Beecher Stowe , “Foreshadowings”, inUncle Tom’s Cabin; or, Life among the Lowly , volume II, Boston, Mass.:John P[unchard] Jewett & Company ; Cleveland, Oh.: Jewett, Proctor & Worthington, published20 March 1852 ,→OCLC ,page81 :Cough ! you don't need to tellme about acough . I've always been subject to acough , all my days.[ …] O! Eva'scough is not anything.
( figurative ) Anoise orsound like a cough(sense 1 ) .sudden, often involuntary expulsion of air from the lungs through the glottis, and out through the mouth
Albanian:kollë (sq) f Alviri-Vidari:Vidari:[script needed] ( kolle ) Arabic:سُعْلَة f ( suʕla ) ,سُعَال m ( suʕāl ) Egyptian Arabic:كحة f ( kuḥa, kaḥa ) Hijazi Arabic:كحة f ( kuḥḥa ) Moroccan Arabic:سعلة f ( suʕla ) ,كحبة f ( kuḥba ) ,كحة f ( kuḥḥa ) Armenian:հազ (hy) ( haz ) Aromanian:tusi f Assyrian Neo-Aramaic:ܫܥܘܿܠܵܐ m ( šˁōlā ) ,ܫܥܵܠܵܐ m ( šˁālā ) Asturian:tos (ast) f ,tus (ast) f Azerbaijani:öskürək (az) ,öskürtü Bashkir:йүткерек ( yütkerek ) ,йүтәл ( yütəl ) Basque:eztul Belarusian:ка́шаль m ( kášalʹ ) Bhojpuri:खांसी ( khānsī ) Bikol Central:abo (bcl) Breton:paz (br) Bulgarian:ка́шлица f ( kášlica ) Burmese:ချောင်း (my) ( hkyaung: ) Buryat:ханяадан ( xanjaadan ) ,ханяалга ( xanjaalga ) Catalan:tos (ca) f Cebuano:ubo Chamicuro:e'tes̈huli Chinese:Mandarin:咳嗽 (zh) ( késou ) Cornish:pas m Crimean Tatar:öksürik Czech:kašel (cs) m Danish:hoste (da) c Dutch:hoest (nl) m ,kuch (nl) m Esperanto:tuso Estonian:köha Extremaduran:tossi f Finnish:yskähdys (fi) ,yskäisy (fi) French:toux (fr) f Friulian:tos m Galician:tose (gl) f ,tusido m Georgian:ხველა ( xvela ) ,დახველება ( daxveleba ) German:Husten (de) m Greek:βήχας (el) m ( víchas ) Ancient:βήξ m ( bḗx ) Guaraní:hu'u (gn) Hawaiian:kunu Hebrew:שיעול \ שִׁעוּל (he) m ( shi'úl ) Higaonon:ubo Hiligaynon:obo Hindi:खांसी f ( khānsī ) ,खाँसी (hi) f ( khā̃sī ) Hungarian:köhögés (hu) Icelandic:hósti (is) m Ido:tuso (io) Ilocano:uyek Indonesian:batuk (id) Interlingua:tusse ,tussir Irish:casacht f Italian:tosse (it) f ,colpo di tosse m Japanese:咳 (ja) ( せき, seki ) Javanese:watuk (jv) Jeju:지침 ( jichim ) Kapampangan:uku Kazakh:жөтел ( jötel ) Khmer:ក្អក (km) ( kʼɑɑk ) Kinaray-a:ubo Korean:기침 (ko) ( gichim ) Kurdish:Northern Kurdish:kuxik (ku) f Kyrgyz:жөтөл (ky) ( jötöl ) Lao:ສຽງໄອ ( sīang ʼai ) ,ໄອ ( ʼai ) Latgalian:kuoss Latvian:klepus ,kāss (lv) Lithuanian:kosulys m Lombard:toss (lmo) f ,tuss f Luxembourgish:Houscht (lb) m Macedonian:ка́шлица f ( kášlica ) Malay:batuk (ms) Malayalam:ചുമ (ml) ( cuma ) Meru:kibara Mongolian:ханиад (mn) ( xaniad ) ,ханиалга (mn) ( xanialga ) Navajo:dikos Nepali:खोकी (ne) ( khokī ) Norman:toux f ( Jersey ) Norwegian:Bokmål:host n Nynorsk:host n Occitan:tos (oc) f Old English:hwōsta m Old Javanese:watuk Oromo:qufaa Ossetian:хуыфӕг ( x°yfæg ) Ottoman Turkish:اوكسوروك ( öksürük ) Pangasinan:okok Persian:سرفه (fa) ( sorfe ) Plautdietsch:Hoost m Polish:kaszel (pl) m Portuguese:tosse (pt) f Punjabi:ਖੰਘ f ( khaṅgh ) Quechua:uhu Romanian:tuse (ro) f Russian:ка́шель (ru) m ( kášelʹ ) Scots:coch ,hoast Scottish Gaelic:casad m Serbo-Croatian:Cyrillic:кашаљ m Roman:kašalj (sh) m Sicilian:tussi (scn) f Slovak:kašeľ (sk) m Slovene:kašelj (sl) m Spanish:tos (es) f Swahili:kikohozi (sw) Swedish:hostning (sv) c Tagalog:ubo (tl) Tajik:сулфа (tg) ( sulfa ) Tamil:இருமல் (ta) ( irumal ) Tatar:ютәл (tt) ( yutäl ) Tausug:ubu Telugu:దగ్గు (te) ( daggu ) Thai:การไอ (th) ,ไอ (th) ( ai ) ,อาการไอ Tibetan:གློ ( glo ) Tocharian B:kosi Turkish:öksürük (tr) Turkmen:üsgülewük Ukrainian:ка́шель m ( kášelʹ ) Urdu:کھانسی f ( khānsī ) Uyghur:يۆتەل ( yötel ) Uzbek:yoʻtal (uz) Venetan:tose f ,tos Vietnamese:sự ho (vi) Volapük:kög (vo) Walloon:tosse (wa) m or f Waray-Waray:ubo Welsh:peswch (cy) m White Hmong:hnoos Yiddish:הוסט ( hust ) Yoruba:ikọ́ Zazaki:kığte
bout of repeated coughing; medical condition that causes one to cough
noise or sound like a cough
Finnish:yskä (fi) Macedonian:please add this translation if you can
Translations to be checked
cough
Used torepresent thesound of a cough(noun sense 1) , especially whenfocusing attention on afollowing utterance , often anattribution ofblame or aeuphemism :ahem .He was—cough —indisposed.
used to represent the sound of a cough
Finnish:köh (fi) Macedonian:please add this translation if you can Swedish:host (sv)
^ “cough,v. 1 ”, inOED Online , Oxford:Oxford University Press ,July 2023 ;“cough,v. ”, inLexico ,Dictionary.com ;Oxford University Press ,2019–2022 . ^ “cough,n. ”, inMED Online , Ann Arbor, Mich.:University of Michigan ,2007 . ^ Compare“cough,n. ”, inOED Online , Oxford:Oxford University Press ,July 2023 ;“cough,n. ”, inLexico ,Dictionary.com ;Oxford University Press ,2019–2022 . Fromcoughen .
IPA (key ) : /kɔu̯x/ ,/kɔx/ ,/kɔu̯/ cough (uncountable )
coughing