Hooray

[Dr. Goodword]

• hooray •

Pronunciation: hu-ray • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Interjection

Meaning: An exclamation of elation, joy for success or victory,

Notes: Here is an exclamation of joy that has been converted into a noun and verb. The sense of the noun is a cry of "hooray" and that of the verb is "to shout 'hooray'". It also has variants: hurray, hurrah, and hurroo.

In Play: This word is an interjection often heard at celebrations: "Hooray for Perce Emmons; after seven years he finally graduated from college." Its variant, hurrah (or hoorah), seems preferred when used as a noun or verb in the sense of "celebration": "Let's get the guys all together for one last hurrah."

Word History: Everyone seems to think that today's Good Word started out as huzza. Similar shouts have been recorded in Danish, German, and Swedish. Huzza then became hurrah, perhaps influenced by hurra, the battle cry of the Prussians in the War of Liberation (1812-13), which became a favorite cry of soldiers and sailors in many countries. It popped up in many forms after the Zs became Rs: hurray, hurroo, and hoorah. Since it had no lexical relations, it ran wild for centuries. (Today's wild Good Word started out as a thought in the mind of Mike Nichols, who was kind enough to share it with us.)

[David Myer]

So how did the prefix 'hip hip' develop? It seems to be an invocation to those around to join in the congratulatory noises. But whence did it come?

[Slava]

Courtesy of Etymonline:

exclamation used to introduce a united cheer (as in hip-hip-hurrah), 1827, earlier hep; compare German hepp, to animals a cry to attack game, to mobs a cry to attack Jews (see hep (2)); perhaps a natural sound (such as Latin eho, heus).

I'd never heard of the hep(2) before. Sad what we humans will do to each other.

[David Myer]

Extraordinary! And yes, very sad.