Forms: 1 ʓielp, ʓelp, ʓilp, ʓylp, 2–6 ȝelp(e, (3 ȝealp, ȝælp, ȝeolp, Orm. ȝellp), 5– yelp. [OE. ʓielp, etc. vainglory, pride = OS. gelp defiant or arrogant speech, OHG., MHG. gelph, gelf loud crying, outcry, cheerfulness, exuberance, ON. gjalp? boasting, noise of the sea: see next.]
I. † 1. Boasting, vainglorious speaking. Idle yelp, vain boasting. Obs.
Beowulf, 2521. Ʒif ic wiste hu wið ðam aʓlæcean elles meahte ʓylpe wiðgripan.
c. 888. Ælfred, Boeth., xix. § 1. Hwæt forstent eow þonne se ʓilp?
c. 900. trans. Bæda’s Hist., III. xvii. (1890), 206. Næfde he on him naðer ne yrre ne oferhyd ne ʓylsunge, ne idel ʓylp him on ne ricsade.
c. 1000. Ælfric, Hom., II. 220. Se seofoða heafod-leahter is ʓehaten idelwuldor, þæt is ʓylp.
c. 1175. Lamb. Hom., 103. [He] deð for ȝelpe mare þenne for godes luue ȝif he awiht delan wule.
c. 1200. Ormin, 4902. Þiss mahhte … cwennkeþþ i þin herrte All rosinng, & all idell ȝellp.
a. 1225. Leg. Kath., 865. Ha beoð ful of idel ȝelp.
c. 1330. R. Brunne, Chron. Wace (Rolls), 9836. Of gret los mighte he make his ȝelpe.
a. 1400–c. 1460. Towneley Myst., iii. 321. Without any yelp, At my myght shall I help.
c. 1400. Laud Troy Bk., 15602. Off her goddis myȝt made thei ȝelp.
† b. An object of boasting. Obs.
c. 1320. Cast. Love, 1364. Þis is vie child and vre help, Vre strengþe and vre ȝelp.
II. 2. A cry characteristic of dogs and some other animals, resembling a bark but distinguished from it by being sharp and shrill.
1500–20. Dunbar, Poems, xxxii. 10. He [sc. a tod] braisit hir [sc. a lamb’s] bony body sweit,… Syne schuk his taill, with quhinge and ȝelp.
1501. Douglas, Pal. Hon., I. iii. This laithlie flude … In quhome the fisch ȝelland as eluis schoutit, Thair ȝelpis wilde my heiring all fordeifit.
a. 1627. Middleton, Witch, III. iii. No howles of woolves, no yelpes of hounds.
1681. Crowne, Hen. VI., I. II. 14. I … hear the Howles of Wolves, and Yelpes of Foxes.
1682. Flavel, Fear, 1. Some are as timorous as hares and start at every sound or yelp of a dog.
1801. Southey, Thalaba, IX. xviii. The dogs, with eager yelp, Are struggling to be free.
1840. Thackeray, Barber Cox, March. After hearing a yelp here, and a howl there, tow, row, yow, yow, yow! bursts out.
1848. ‘F. Forester,’ Field Sports, II. 325. A sort of pipe or call by which the cry or yelp, as it is termed, of the female [sc. the wild turkey-hen] may be simulated.
1868. Tennyson, Lucretius, 45. The dog With inward yelp and restless forefoot plies His function of the woodland.
1886. J. K. Jerome, Idle Thoughts, 129. The watch-dog … wakes with a yelp of gladness to greet a caressing hand.
b. transf. and fig.
1775. Johnson, Tax. no Tyr., 89. If slavery be thus fatally contagious, how is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of negroes?
1825. Croker, Fairy Leg Irel., I. 48. The whinge, and the yelp, and the screech, and the yowl, was never out of his mouth.
1866. Ballantyne, Shifting Winds, xxiv. The [engine] driver vented his impatience … by causing the whistle to give three sharp yelps.
1885. Runciman, Skippers & Shellbacks, 241. The yelp of a Norwegian seaman who was hauling on a rope.
c. The syllable yelp used imitatively.
1831–4. R. S. Surtees, Jorrocks’s Jaunts, i. (1838), 10. ‘Yelp, yelp, yelp,’ howl the hounds.
1835. W. Irving, Tour Prairies, 299. Yelp! yelp! yelp! passed from mouth to mouth. There was a sudden dispersal.
