hang
Forms
- present (v1)
- hang
- past (v2)
- hung
- past participle (v3)
- hung
- present participle
- hanging
- 3rd person singular
- hangs
- Plural
- hangs
Definitions
1.To be or remain suspended.
- The lights hung from the ceiling.
2.To float, as if suspended.
- The smoke hung in the room.
- It was a couple of days after the crash, with the smell of burning still hanging in the air from the incinerated wreckage of Coach H, where 31 passengers lost their lives, when I visited the West London site.
3.To veer in one direction.
- I wonder where to hang this picture that Tom gave me.
4.To rebound unexpectedly or unusually slowly, due to backward spin on the ball or imperfections of the ground.
- I wonder where to hang this picture that Tom gave me.
1.A slackening of motion.
2.A sharp or steep declivity or slope.
3.The way in which something hangs.
- This skirt has a nice hang.
4.A mass of hanging material.
- They advanced in a crouch, dropping to their knees every few yards to pass under a hang of rock.
Frequency
Overall
Common· #843
By learning goal
- Everyday conversation
- Uncommon
- General reading & writing
- Common
- Academic
- Rare
- Literature
- Uncommon
Etymology
From Middle English hangen, hongen, from a fusion of Old English hōn (“to hang, be hanging”, transitive verb) and hangian (“to hang, cause to hang”, intransitive verb), respectively from the transitive verb Proto-West Germanic *hą̄han and the intransitive verb *hangēn; also probably influenced by Old Norse hengja (“to suspend”) and hanga (“to be suspended”); all from Proto-Germanic *hanhaną and *hangāną, from Proto-Indo-European *ḱenk- (“to waver, be in suspense”).