bray

English

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) enPR: breɪ, IPA^(key): /bɹeɪ/

• Audio (GA)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -eɪ
• Homophone: brae

Etymology 1

The verb is derived from Middle English brayen, brai, bray, braye (“of a person or animal: to vocalize loudly; of the weather: to make a loud sound, howl, roar”), from Old French brai, braire (“of an animal: to bray; of a person: to cry or shout out”) (modern French braire (“of an animal: to bray; of a person: to shout; to cry, weep”)), possibly from Vulgar Latin *bragiō, from Gaulish *bragu (compare Breton breugiñ (“to bray”), brammañ (“to flatulate”), Cornish bramma, brabma (“to flatulate”), Old Irish braigid (“to flatulate”)), from Proto-Celtic *brageti, *bragyeti (“to flatulate”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰreHg- (“to flatulate; to stink”); cognate with Latin fragrō (“to smell”). Alternatively, the word could be from a Germanic source, ultimately from Proto-Germanic *brekaną (“to break”), and cognate with frangere (“to break, shatter”).

The noun is derived from the verb, or from Middle English brai, brait (“shriek; outcry”), from Old French brai, brait (“a cry”), from braire (“of an animal: to bray; of a person: to shout; to cry, weep”); see above.

Verb

bray (third-person singular simple present brays, present participle braying, simple past and past participle brayed)

1. (intransitive) Of an animal (now chiefly of animals related to the ass or donkey, and the camel): to make its cry.

   Synonyms: (archaic, dialectal) blore, (ass or donkey) hee-haw

   Whenever I walked by, that donkey brayed at me.

   • 1712 April 27 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison; Richard Steele et al.], “WEDNESDAY, April 16, 1712”, in The Spectator, number 354; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, , volume IV, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC, page 293:

     When she went to the famous ass-race [...], it was not, like other ladies, to hear those poor animals bray, nor see fellows run naked, or to hear country squires in bob wigs and white girdles make love at the side of a coach and cry, "Madam, this is dainty weather."

     The spelling has been modernized.

   • 1792 July, “Art. II. Interesting Anecdotes of Henry IV. of France. Containing Sublime Traits and Lively Sallies of Wit of that Monarch; . Translated from the French. Crown 8vo. 2 Vols. 6s. Boards. Debrett. 1792. ”, in The Monthly Review; or, Literary Journal, Enlarged, volume VIII, London: Printed for R[alph] Griffiths; and sold by T Becket, , published 1794, →OCLC, page 249:

     Henry [IV of France], paſſing through a little town, ſaw ſeveral deputies coming up to harangue him. One of them having commenced his diſcourſe, was interrupted by an aſs, who began to bray. "Gentlemen," cried the King, "one at a time, if you pleaſe."—

   • 1812, Count de Buffon [i.e., Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon], “The Ass”, in William Smellie, transl., Natural History, General and Particular, . The History of Man and Quadrupeds: Translated, with Notes and Observations,  In Twenty Volumes, volume IV, London: Printed for T Cadell and W Davies, , →OCLC, page 174:

     The horse neighs, but the ass brays: the last is performed by a very loud, long, disagreeable, discordant cry, consisting of discords alternately sharp and flat. He seldom brays but when pressed with hunger or love. [...] When gelded, the ass brays with a low voice; and, though he makes the same efforts and the same motions of the throat, yet the sound reaches to no great distance.

2. (intransitive, by extension) To make a harsh, discordant sound like a donkey's bray.

   He threw back his head and brayed with laughter.

   • 1757 August 8, [Thomas] Gray, “The Bard. A Pindaric Ode.”, in Poems by Mr. Gray, London: Printed for J Dodsley, , published 1768, →OCLC, stanza II.3, page 64:

     Heard ye the din of battle bray, / Lance to lance, and horſe to horſe? / Long Years of havock urge their deſtined courſe, / And thro' the kindred ſquadrons mow their way.

   • 1986, John le Carré [pseudonym; David John Moore Cornwell], A Perfect Spy, London: Hodder & Stoughton, →ISBN; 1st Pocket Books trade paperback edition, New York, N.Y.: Pocket Books, January 2003, →ISBN, page 400:

     "But, Jack, it's all so circumstantial—you said so yourself," Brammel brayed, never stronger than when demonstrating that two positives made a negative.

3. (transitive) To make or utter (a shout, sound, etc.) discordantly, loudly, or in a harsh and grating manner.
   • 1667, John Milton, “Book VI”, in Paradise Lost. , London: [Samuel Simmons], , →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: , London: Basil Montagu Pickering , 1873, →OCLC, lines 207–211:

     [N]ow ſtorming furie roſe, / And clamour ſuch as heard in Heav'n till now / Was never, Arms on Armour claſhing bray'd / Horrible discord, and the madding Wheeles / Of brazen Chariots rag'd; [...]

   • 1808 February 22, Walter Scott, “Canto Fifth. The Court.”, in Marmion; a Tale of Flodden Field, Edinburgh: J Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Company, ; London: William Miller, and John Murray, →OCLC, stanza V, page 247:

     Just then the chiefs their tribes arrayed, / And wild and garish semblance made, / The chequered trews, and belted plaid, / And varying notes the war-pipes brayed, / To every varying clan; [...]

Derived terms

• brayer
• braying (noun)
• brayingly

Translations

See also

• (equine laugh): horselaugh

Noun

bray (plural brays)

1. The cry of an animal, now chiefly that of animals related to the ass or donkey, or the camel.

   Synonym: (ass or donkey) hee-haw

2. (by extension) Any discordant, grating, or harsh sound.
   • 1843, [Douglas William Jerrold], “A Gossip at the Reculvers ”, in Douglas Jerrold, editor, The Illuminated Magazine, volume I, London: Published for the proprietors, , →OCLC, page 143, column 2:

     It seems a very nest—warm and snug, and green—for human life; with the twilight haze of time about it, almost consecrating it from the aching hopes and feverish expectations of the present. Who would think that the bray and roar of multitudinous London sounded but some sixty miles away?

   • 1876 April, “Gosse’s King Erik: King Erik. By Edmund W. Gosse. London: Chatto and Windus. 1876. ”, in The London Quarterly Review, volume XLVI, number XCI, London: Published for the proprietors, at the Wesleyan Conference Office, , →OCLC, page 257:

     [...] Mr. [Edmund] Gosse's blank verse is sweet and varied, and full mostly of a graceful melody. If it has not the trumpet's power, neither has it the trumpet's bray, but rather a flute-like tone of its own.

   • 2005, Merline Lovelace, The Last Bullet (Cleo North Trilogy; 3), Ontario: Mira Books, →ISBN, page 15:

     At full volume, Doreen's whinnying laugh could shatter glass. Even at half volume, her high-pitched brays rattled teeth.

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English brayen (“to break or crush into pieces”), from Anglo-Norman breier, Old French breie, breier, broiier (modern French broyer (“to crush, grind”)), possibly from Frankish *brekan (“to break”), from Proto-Germanic *brekaną (“to break”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰreg- (“to break”); thus making the English word a doublet of break.

Verb

bray (third-person singular simple present brays, present participle braying, simple past and past participle brayed)

1. (transitive, archaic) To crush or pound, especially using a pestle and mortar.
   • 1611, The Holy Bible,  (King James Version), London: Robert Barker, , →OCLC, Proverbs 27:22:

     Though thou ſhouldeſt bray a fool in a morter among wheate with a peſtell, yet will not his fooliſhneſſe depart from him.

   • 1624, John Smith, “The Commodities in Virginia, or that May Be Had by Industrie”, in The Generall Historie of Virginia, New-England, and the Summer Isles: , London: I D and I H for Michael Sparkes, →OCLC, book 2; reprinted in The Generall Historie of Virginia, (Bibliotheca Americana), Cleveland, Oh.: The World Publishing Company, 1966, →OCLC, page 30:

     Their heads and ſhoulders are painted red with the roote Pocone brayed to powder, mixed with oyle, this they hold in ſommer to preſerue them from the heate, and in winter from the cold.

   • 1625, Samuel Purchas, “Their Cocos and other fruits and food, their Trades and trading, Creatures profitable and hurtfull. Of Male their principall Iland. Their Houſes, Candou, Languages, Apparell.”, in Pvrchas his Pilgrimes. In Five Bookes. The Second Part., volume II, London: Printed by William Stansby for Henrie Fetherstone, , →OCLC, page 1643 [sic: 1653]:

     They boyle it alſo, and after dry it and bray it, and of this bran, with egges, hony, milke, and butter of Cocos, they make Florentines, and verie good belly-timber.

2. (transitive, British, chiefly Yorkshire, by extension) To hit (someone or something).
   • 2011, Sarah Hall, “Butcher’s Perfume”, in The Beautiful Indifference, London: Faber and Faber, →ISBN, page 25:

     If anything he brayed him all the harder – the old family bull recognising his fighting days were close to over.

Translations

References

Anagrams

• Raby, Ryba, bary-, yarb

Middle English

Verb

bray

1. Alternative form of brayen (“to cry”)