What does heehawed mean?
Heehawed is the past tense and past participle of heehaw, an English verb with two closely related uses. An animal, especially a donkey, heehaws by making a loud braying cry; a person heehaws by laughing loudly and boisterously. The expression is deliberately imitative, echoing the “hee-haw” sound associated with donkeys, and it transfers that animal cry to human mirth. In literary and informal contexts, heehawed can suggest laughter that is broad, unrestrained, and perhaps rustic or old-fashioned rather than quiet or controlled. The donkey sense is the more literal, while the laughter sense is especially associated with descriptions of crowds, banquets, and scenes of rustic amusement. Because the word evokes both a recognizable animal sound and conspicuous amusement, it adds a vivid comic note to prose. Its uncommonness makes it particularly effective when an author wants to describe a sound or laugh with a strong, memorable character.
verbTo laugh loudly and boisterously; to bray like a donkey.
- To laugh loudly and boisterously.
- To make the braying cry of a donkey.
"The old mule heehawed across the field while the crowd burst into laughter."
"The audience heehawed with delight at the storyteller's performance."
"One of the donkeys heehawed so loudly that the entire stable turned to look."
Heehawed lets a donkey's bray do double duty: first as an animal sound, then as a roar of human laughter.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Where does heehawed come from?
Heehaw is an English imitative formation modeled on the braying cry of a donkey. Its reduplicative sound belongs to a family of English animal noises that imitate calls rather than deriving transparently from an inherited root. The word was later extended by analogy from the donkey's cry to loud, unrestrained human laughter.
Related word forms
How heehawed is actually used
Chiefly literary, informal, and somewhat old-fashioned. The word is associated both with a donkey's bray and, by extension, with loud, rustic or unrestrained human laughter.