ay

Interjection (1)

1. Ah! alas! Expressing anger, alarm, frustration, pain, etc.
   • And ſuch as yet, coulde neuer weapon wꝛeſt, / But on the lappe are woont to dandled be, / Ne yet foꝛgotten had the mothers bꝛeſt, / How greekes them ſlew, alas here ſhall ye ſe, / To make repoꝛte therof, ay woe is me, / My ſong is miſchiefe, murder miſerye.1559, Lucius, Anneus, Seneca, translated by Iasper Heywood, “The Preface to the Tragedye”, in The Sixt Tragedie of the Most Graue and Prudent Author Lucius, Anneus, Seneca, Entituled Troas, […]...
2. (Northern England, Scotland) Expressing earnestness, surprise, wonder, etc.
   • Ay my word! I am glad to see you.1863, Mrs. Toogood, Specimens of the Yorkshire Dialect; quoted in “Ay (ēⁱ), int.”, in James A[ugustus] H[enry] Murray [et al.], editors, A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (Oxford...
   • Under the strain of this continually impending doom and by the sleeplessness to which I now condemned myself, ay, even beyond what I had thought possible to man, I became, in my own person, a creature eaten up and emptied by fever, languidly weak both in body and mind, and solely occupied by one...1886 January 5, Robert Louis Stevenson, “Henry Jekyll’s Full Statement of the Case”, in Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., →OCLC, page 137
3. Used in ay, ay.

Adverb

IPA/ˈeɪ/

ay (not comparable)

1. (Northern England, Scotland, archaic, poetic) Always; ever; continually; for an indefinite time.
   • O he that hath ay lived free, …1670, John Barbour, The Acts and Life of the most victorious Conquerour Robert Bruce King of Scotland, as cited in 1860, Thomas Corser, Collectanea Anglo-poetica, page 160

   Synonyms:

   always, continually, forever

Interjection (2)

1. New Zealand spelling of eh (question tag).
   • For example, New Zealanders tended to say "ay" at the end of sentences, but in the Asian community people used different tags to check whether people were still listening.2013 November 13, “Surprising changes in the way Aucklanders speak”, in Stuff

Interjection (3)

IPA/eɪ/

1. All right (inter); hooray (inter); cool (inter).

Noun capitalized: AY

AY (plural AYs)

1. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of academic year.