throw up

See also: throwup and throw-up

English

WOTD – 2 August 2011

Etymology

The vomit sense is a clipping of throw up one's accounts (18th century), from earlier idiom cast up one's accounts (15th century).

Pronunciation

• Audio (US):

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• Audio (General Australian):

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Verb

throw up (third-person singular simple present throws up, present participle throwing up, simple past threw up, past participle thrown up)

1. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see throw,‎ up.
   • 1823, Clement Clarke Moore, 'Twas the Night Before Christmas:

     Away to the window I flew like a flash,
     Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.

   • 1910, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventure of the Devil's Foot:

     The servant (who) had first entered had thrown up the window […]

2. (intransitive, transitive, now informal, bacteriology) To vomit.

   The baby threw up all over my shirt.

   That cat is always throwing up hairballs.

   • 1988 September 19, Bill Watterson, Calvin & Hobbes (comic):

     I wonder what happens if you throw up in zero gravity.

3. (transitive) To produce or reveal something new or unexpected.

   This system has thrown up a few problems.

4. (transitive) To cause something such as dust or water to rise into the air.

   The car wheels threw up a shower of stones.

5. (transitive, chiefly dated) To erect, particularly hastily.
   • 1872, Every Saturday, page 96:

     Every depression in the ground had been utilized; every rise taken advantage of, to dig rifle-pits or throw up a little earthwork, surrounded with sand-bags […]

   • 2001, Diane Kennedy, Loop-Holes of the Rich: How the Rich Legally Make More Money & Pay Less Tax, Warner Books,, →ISBN, page 70:

     In other words, a business can throw up a huge detour sign in the way of the government.

   • 2007, Marissa Monteilh, Dr. Feelgood, Kensington Books, →ISBN, page 27:

     The deal was that if anyone started catching feelings, he could throw up a stop sign and the other would honor it.

6. (transitive, intransitive) To give up, abandon something.
   • 1859, Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities:

     “No!” returned the spy. “I throw up. I confess that we were so unpopular with the outrageous mob, that I only got away from England at the risk of being ducked to death, and that Cly was so ferreted up and down, that he never would have got away at all but for that sham. Though how this man knows it was a sham, is a wonder of wonders to me.”

   • 2011, Alan Bennett, “Baffled at a Bookcase”, in London Review of Books, XXXIII.15:

     In 1944, believing, as people in Leeds tended to do, that flying bombs or no flying bombs, things were better Down South, Dad threw up his job with the Co-op and we migrated to Guildford.

7. (transitive) To display a gang sign using the hands.
   • 2005, Brandon Bennett, Moon in Gemini, iUniverse, →ISBN, page 56:

     Why don't you go on and throw up ya gang sign. Represent your hood, homey?

8. (dated, transitive) To enlarge, as a picture reflected on a screen.
9. (obsolete, transitive, printing) To give special prominence to a line or lines.

Synonyms

• (vomit): chuck up, hurl, upchuck (colloquial); vomit
• (erect hastily): knock up

Derived terms

• throw up the sponge

Translations

to vomit — see vomit

to produce something new or unexpected

• Spanish: lanzar (es)

to cause something such as dust or water to rise into the air

• Irish: cuir in airde
• Spanish: levantar (es)

to erect, particularly hastily

• Irish: caith suas
• Persian: راست بودن (râst budan), راست ایستادن (râst istâdan), شق بودن (šaq budan)
• Spanish: construir rápidamente y mal

to give up, abandon

• Irish: caith uait
• Russian: оста́вить (ru) pf (ostávitʹ), бро́сить (ru) pf (brósitʹ), отказа́ться (ru) pf (otkazátʹsja)
• Spanish: dejar (es), abandonar (es), parar (es)

to display a gang sign using the hands

• Spanish: echar barrio

Noun

throw up (uncountable)

1. (colloquial) Misspelling of throwup (“vomit”).

   We had to scrub the seats for throw up when we left the dog in the car.

Alternative forms

• throwup, throw-up

Interjection

throw up

1. (dismissal) Used as an expression of frustration or to dismiss a conversation partner.
   • 2011, Kate Cann, Consumed:

     "Oh, throw up," thought Rayne. "Don't say they've taken a fancy to each other."

   • 2018, Hillary Homzie, Apple Pie Promises, Sky Pony Press:

     Oh, throw up. Really? Since when does Hannah need to be rescued by anyone for anything?

   • 2020 December 10, @SherK50662136, X‎^[1]:

     Oh throw up... Biden & Harris are both losers.

   • 2022 March 22, @Bandwagonfan9, X‎^[2]:

     Oh throw up. Pringle is better than Hardman. Chiefs done for a long ass time

See also

• throw down

Anagrams

• upthrow