hay

• enPR: hā, IPA^(key): /heɪ/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Homophone: hey
• Rhymes: -eɪ

From Middle English hey, from Old English hīġ, hīeġ, from Proto-Germanic *hawją (compare West Frisian hea, Dutch hooi, German Heu, Norwegian høy), from *hawwaną (“to hew, cut down”). More at hew.

hay (countable and uncountable, plural hays)

1. (uncountable) Grass cut and dried for use as animal fodder.
   • Camden

     Make hay while the sun shines.

   • C. L. Flint

     Hay may be dried too much as well as too little.

2. (countable) Any mix of green leafy plants used for fodder.
3. (slang) Cannabis; marijuana.
   • 1947, William Burroughs, letter, 19 Feb 1947:

     I would like some of that hay. Enclose $20.

4. A net set around the haunt of an animal, especially a rabbit.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Rowe to this entry?)

5. (obsolete) A hedge.
6. (obsolete) A circular country dance.
   • 1594, Christopher Marlowe, Edward II, London: William Jones,

     My men like Satyres grazing on the lawnes,

     Shall with their Goate feete daunce an antick hay,

   • c. 1594, William Shakespeare, Love’s Labour’s Lost, Act V, Scene 1,

     I’ll make one in a dance, or so; or I will play

     On the tabour to the Worthies, and let them dance the hay.

• hay on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

hay (third-person singular simple present hays, present participle haying, simple past and past participle hayed)

1. To cut grasses or herb plants for use as animal fodder.
2. To lay snares for rabbits.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Huloet to this entry?)

• bale
• straw

From the sound it represents, by analogy with other letters such as kay and gay. The expected form in English if the h had survived in the Latin name of the letter "h", hā.

hay (plural hays)

1. The letter for the h sound in Pitman shorthand.

• aitch, the Latin letter for this sound

• AYH, YHA, Yah, yah

hay

1. Alternative form of he

• “he, pron. (3)” in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 12 June 2018.

hay

1. first-person singular present indicative of hayr

From Old Spanish ha i (“it has there”) (compare Catalan hi ha and French il y a), from ha, third-person singular present of haber (“to have”), + i, enclitic form of ahí, from Latin ibī (“there”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈai/, [ˈai̯]
• Rhymes: -ai
• Homophone: ay

hay

1. (impersonal) Present indicative form of haber, there is, there are

   Hay dos tiendas que venden películas.

   There are two stores that sell films.

• (Hà Nội) IPA^(key): [haj˧˧]
• (Huế) IPA^(key): [haj˧˧]
• (Hồ Chí Minh City) IPA^(key): [haj˧˧]

Cognate with Arem [hɪː] ("to understand").

hay

1. (archaic or literary) to know; to get to know; to learn
   • 2018 January 22, Viễn Sự, Sơn Lâm, “Trẻ con lai ở miền Tây: Con không cha như nhà không nóc [The mixed children in Southwestern Vietnam: a fatherless child is like a roofless house]”, in Tuổi Trẻ Online‎:

     Hồi mẹ nó ẵm về nước, bà nội nó nói mua cho cái vé khứ hồi, tới hồi ra sân bay về lại Hàn Quốc thì mới hay cái vé đi có một chiều.

     When his mother carried him in her arms back to Vietnam, his paternal grandmother said they had bought a return ticket for her, but she realised it was only a one-way ticket when she was at the airport, trying to return to Korea.

2. (‘hay’ + verb) to have a habit of (doing something)

   Con hay nói nhiều lắm ― You, child, have a habit of talking too much / You, child, are talkative

• The sense of “to know” is now mostly used in fixed expressions.

hay

1. exciting, interesting

   Phim này hay ― This film is interesting

   Antonyms: dở, tệ

hay (là)

1. or

   Chọn cái này, hay chọn cái kia

   Choose this one, or choose that one

• hoặc

• IPA^(key): /haj/

hay

1. go, let us go