Other forms: thumping, thumped, thumps
A thump is a heavy dull blow and the sound it makes. A fist on a table, a football against a garage door, a suitcase dropped at the top of the stairs.
Thump is also a verb, and it works three ways. Things thump: rain thumps on a caravan roof, boots thump down a corridor. Hearts thump, which is what yours does after two flights of stairs or a noise downstairs at night. And in informal British English you thump a person, meaning hit them once with a fist, which is a playground word rather than a courtroom one. Thump is the near twin of thud, the difference being that a thud is only a sound while a thump can be something you do to somebody. Thumping also works as an intensifier: a thumping great lie, a thumping majority.
1nounthumpA heavy dull blow, or the low sound it makes.
“The parcel landed on the mat with a thump.”
2verbheavilyTo hit something heavily, or to fall against it with that sound.
“He thumped the side of the machine and it started working.”
3verbheartOf the heart: to beat hard and fast.
“Her heart was thumping so loudly she was sure he could hear it.”
4verbfistTo hit a person with your fist. Informal.
“If you say that one more time I will thump you.”
Thump is not descended from anything. It turns up in the middle of the sixteenth century as an imitation of the noise itself, made rather than inherited. Words built this way are called echoic: they are their own definition. Say it slowly and you can hear the job it was built for, the lips closing and the whole word landing.
Mid 16th century, probably imitative of the sound.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA
Practised in A Man Called Ove, Sounds & Noises
First appears in chapter 3 of A Man Called Ove.
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