jump

• (UK, US) enPR: jŭmp, IPA^(key): /dʒʌmp/, [d͡ʒʌmp]

• Audio (US)

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• Rhymes: -ʌmp

A tap dancer jumping.

From Middle English jumpen (“to walk quickly, run, jump”), probably of Middle Low German or North Germanic origin, ultimately from Proto-Germanic *gempaną, *gembaną (“to hop, skip, jump”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʷʰemb- (“to spring, hop, jump”). Cognate with Middle Dutch gumpen (“to jump”), Low German jumpen (“to jump”), Middle High German gumpen, gampen (“to jump, hop”) (dialectal German gampen, Walser dialect kumpu), Danish gumpe (“to jolt”), Swedish gumpa (“to jump”), Danish gimpe (“to move up and down”), Middle English jumpren, jumbren (“to mix, jumble”). Related to jumble.

jump (third-person singular simple present jumps, present participle jumping, simple past and past participle jumped)

1. (intransitive) To propel oneself rapidly upward, downward and/or in any horizontal direction such that momentum causes the body to become airborne.

   The boy jumped over a fence.

   Kangaroos are known for their ability to jump high.

   • Shakespeare

     Not the worst of the three but jumps twelve foot and a half by the square.

2. (intransitive) To cause oneself to leave an elevated location and fall downward.

   She is going to jump from the diving board.

3. (transitive) To pass by a spring or leap; to overleap.

   to jump a stream

4. (intransitive) To employ a parachute to leave an aircraft or elevated location.
5. (intransitive) To react to a sudden, often unexpected, stimulus (such as a sharp prick or a loud sound) by jerking the body violently.

   The sudden sharp sound made me jump.

6. (intransitive) To employ a move in certain board games where one game piece is moved from one legal position to another passing over the position of another piece.

   The player's knight jumped the opponent's bishop.

7. (transitive) To move to a position in (a queue/line) that is further forward.

   I hate it when people jump the queue.

8. (transitive) To attack suddenly and violently.

   The hoodlum jumped a woman in the alley.

9. (transitive) To engage in sexual intercourse.
10. (transitive) To cause to jump.

    The rider jumped the horse over the fence.

11. (transitive) To move the distance between two opposing subjects.
12. (transitive) To increase the height of a tower crane by inserting a section at the base of the tower and jacking up everything above it.
13. (cycling, intransitive) To increase speed aggressively and without warning.
14. (transitive, obsolete) To expose to danger; to risk; to hazard.
    • Shakespeare

      to jump a body with a dangerous physic

15. (transitive, smithwork) To join by a buttweld.
16. To thicken or enlarge by endwise blows; to upset.
17. (quarrying) To bore with a jumper.
18. (obsolete) To coincide; to agree; to accord; to tally; followed by with.
    • Shakespeare

      It jumps with my humour.

19. (intransitive, programming) To start executing code from a different location, rather than following the program counter.
20. (intransitive, slang, archaic) To flee; to make one's escape.
    • 1891, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Red-Headed League

      “It's all clear,” he whispered. “Have you the chisel and the bags? Great Scott! Jump, Archie, jump, and I'll swing for it!”
      Sherlock Holmes had sprung out and seized the intruder by the collar. The other dived down the hole, and I heard the sound of rending cloth as Jones clutched at his skirts.

• (propel oneself upwards): leap, spring
• (cause oneself to leave an elevated location and fall): jump down, jump off
• (employ a parachute to leave an aircraft or elevated location): skydive
• (react to a sudden stimulus by jerking the body violently): flinch, jerk, jump out of one's skin, leap out of one's skin, twitch
• (To engage in sexual intercourse): hump, jump someone's bones

See also jumped, jamp, jumper and jumping

jump (plural jumps)

1. The act of jumping; a leap; a spring; a bound.
   • John Locke

     To advance by jumps.

2. An effort; an attempt; a venture.
   • Shakespeare

     Our fortune lies / Upon this jump.

3. (mining) A dislocation in a stratum; a fault.
4. (architecture) An abrupt interruption of level in a piece of brickwork or masonry.
5. An instance of propelling oneself upwards.

   The boy took a skip and a jump down the lane.

6. An object which causes one to jump, a ramp.

   He went off a jump.

7. An instance of causing oneself to fall from an elevated location.

   There were a couple of jumps from the bridge.

8. An instance of employing a parachute to leave an aircraft or elevated location.

   She was terrified before the jump, but was thrilled to be skydiving.

9. An instance of reacting to a sudden stimulus by jerking the body.
10. A jumping move in a board game.

    the knight's jump in chess

11. A button (of a joypad, joystick or similar device) used to make a video game character jump (propel itself upwards).

    Press jump to start.

12. (sports, horses) An obstacle that forms part of a showjumping course, and that the horse has to jump over cleanly.

    Heartless managed the scale the first jump but fell over the second.

13. (with on) An early start or an advantage.

    He got a jump on the day because he had laid out everything the night before.

    Their research department gave them the jump on the competition.

14. (mathematics) A discontinuity in the graph of a function, where the function is continuous in a punctured interval of the discontinuity.
15. (science fiction) An instance of faster-than-light travel, not observable from ordinary space.
16. (computing) A change of the path of execution to a different location.

• For quotations of use of this term, see Citations:jump.

• (instance of propelling oneself into the air): leap
• (instance of causing oneself to fall from an elevated location):
• (instance of employing a parachute to leave an aircraft or elevated location):
• (instance of reacting to a sudden stimulus by jerking the body): flinch, jerk, twitch

jump (not comparable)

1. (obsolete) exactly; precisely
   • Marcellus, in "Hamlet" by William Shakespeare, act 1 scene 1, l 64-65

     Thus twice before, and jump at this dead hour,

     With martial stalk hath he gone by our watch.

jump (comparative more jump, superlative most jump)

1. (obsolete) Exact; matched; fitting; precise.
   • Ben Jonson

     jump names

Compare French jupe (“a long petticoat, a skirt”) and English jupon.

jump (plural jumps)

1. A kind of loose jacket for men.

• jumper
• jumps