cry

present singular third person cries · participle present crying · participle past cried · past cried · first person past singular cried · archaic first person past singular cryed · archaic first person past singular crode · archaic present second person singular criest · archaic present second person singular cryest · past second person singular cried · archaic past second person singular cryed · archaic past second person singular criedst · archaic past second person singular cryedst · archaic past second person singular crode · present singular third person cries · archaic present singular third person crieth

1. intransitiveTo shed tears; to weep, especially in anger or sadness.

   That sad movie always makes me cry.

   1 more example

   - Emerl: “There’s nothing worse than making a girl cry!” That’s what Sonic said...

   2003, Sonic Team, Sonic Battle, Sega, published 2003, Game Boy Advance, level/area: Cream’s Story

2. transitiveTo utter loudly; to call out; to declare publicly.

   All, all, cry shame against ye, yet I'll speak.

   c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii]

   1 more example

   [T]he Man put his fingers in his Ears, and ran on crying, Life, Life, Eternal Life: [...]

   1678, John Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress from This World, to That which is to Come: […], London: […] Nath[aniel] Ponder […], →OCLC, page 3

3. ambitransitiveTo shout, scream, yell.

   And about the ninth hour, Jesus cried with a loud voice.

   1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Matthew 27:46

4. figurativelyintransitiveTo forcefully attract attention or proclaim one’s presence.

   My secrets cry aloud. I have no need for tongue.

   1941, Theodore Roethke, “Open House”, in Open House, New York, N.Y.: Alfred A[braham] Knopf, →OCLC; republished in The Collected Poems of Theodore Roethke, London: Faber and Faber […], 1968, →OCLC, page 3

5. intransitiveTo utter inarticulate sounds, as animals do.

   the young ravens which cry

   1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Psalms 147:9

   1 more example

   In a cowslip's bell I lie / There I couch when owls do cry.

   1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i]

   Synonyms: call

6. transitiveTo cause to do something, or bring to some state, by crying or weeping.

   Tonight I’ll cry myself to sleep.

7. To make oral and public proclamation of; to notify or advertise by outcry, especially things lost or found, goods to be sold, auctioned, etc.

   to cry goods

   3 more examples

   Love is lost, and thus she cries him.

   1652, Richard Crashaw, The Beginning of Heliodorus

   “We're in luck. Loren Passerine, the finest auctioneer in the West, will be crying today.” “Will be what?” “We say an auctioneer ‘cries’ a sale,” Cohen said.

   1966 March, Thomas Pynchon, chapter 6, in The Crying of Lot 49, New York, N.Y.: Bantam Books, published November 1976, →ISBN, page 137

   Oh, Elcid Barrett cried the town / (How I wish I was in Sherbrooke now!) / For twenty brave men, all fishermen, who / Would make for him the Antelope's crew.

   1976, Stan Rogers, “Barrett's Privateers”, in Fogarty's Cove

   1. Hence, to publish the banns of, as for marriage.

      I should not be surprised if they were cried in church next Sabbath.

      1845, Sylvester Judd, Margaret: A Tale of the Real and the Ideal, Blight and Bloom; Including Sketches of a Place Not Before Described, Called Mons Christi

plural cries

1. A shedding of tears; the act of crying.

   After we broke up, I retreated to my room for a good cry.

   1 more example

   Then the next thing They made a swing, But Jill set up a big cry, For the swing gave way, In the midst of the play, And threw her into the pigsty.

   1810, Jack and Jill, and old Dame Gill, York: J. Kendrew, page 10

2. A shout or scream.

   I heard a cry from afar.

3. Words shouted or screamed.

   a battle cry

4. A clamour or outcry.

   His pupil, Maimonides, that he might not be under the necessity of violating the laws of friendship and gratitude, by joining the general cry against Averroes, left Corduba.

   1812, Alexander Chalmers, The General Biographical Dictionary

5. archaiccollectiveA group of hounds.

   A cry more tunable / Was never hollaed to, nor cheered with horn.

   c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “A Midsommer Nights Dreame”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene i]

   2 more examples

   1667, Milton, Paradise Lost, Book II, in Edward Hawkins, The Poetical Works of John Milton: With Notes of Various Authors, Vol. I, W. Baxter, J. Parker, G. B. Whittaker (publs., 1824) pages 124 to 126, lines 648 to 659. […] Before the gates there sat / On either side a formidable shape; / The one seem’d woman to the waste, and fair, / But ended foul in many a scaly fold / Voluminous and vast, a serpent arm’d / With mortal sting: about her middle round / A cry of hell-hounds never ceasing bark’d / With wide Cerberean mouths full loud and rung / A hideous peal; yet, when they list,would creep, / If ought disturb'd their noise, into her womb, / and kennel there, yet there still bark’d and howl’d, / Within unseen. […]

   sometimes I have known such a cry of hounds at uncoupling to take the game at counter

   1830, Arthur Stringer, “The Experienced Huntsman”, in Alexander Henry Higginson, editor, As Hounds Ran, page 28

6. broadlyderogatoryobsoleteA pack or company of people.

   Would not this […] get me a fellowship in a cry of players?

   c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene ii]

7. A typical sound made by the species in question.

   "Woof" is the cry of a dog, while "neigh" is the cry of a horse.

   1 more example

   But the shrill wild cry of the heron overpowered the cries of all the other birds, whom it seemed to terrify; they were silent the moment they heard it, and a silence followed which made the interruption doubly unpleasant.

   1886, Peter Christen Asbjø￵rnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 86

8. A desperate or urgent request.
9. obsoleteCommon report; gossip.

   The cry goes that you shall marry her.

   c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene i]