hullabaloo
Syllables: hul·la·ba·looUK/ˌhʌləbəˈluː//ˌhʌləbəˈlu/
hullabaloo noun: a clamour, a commotion; a fuss or uproar.
Noun
hullabaloo (countable and uncountable, plural hullabaloos)
- A clamour, a commotion; a fuss or uproar.
- They made such a hullabaloo about the change that the authorities were forced to change it back.
- […]The truth of all this hullaballoo was that Rigby had a sly pension which, by an inevitable association of ideas, he always connected with the maintenance of an Aristocracy.1844, Benjamin Disraeli, Coningsby, or The New Generation, volume III, London: Henry Colburn, […], pages 234–235
Verb
hullabaloo (third-person singular simple present hullabaloos, present participle hullabalooing, simple past and past participle hullabalooed)
- To make a commotion or uproar.
- They roared, they danced, they hullaballoed, they pinched one another; they behaved like young savages – but I knew I had got them safe.1844, George Carter Needham, Street Arabs and Gutter Snipes: The Pathetic and Humorous Side of Young Vagabond Life in the Great Cities, with Records of Work for Their Reclamation, D. L. Guernsey
- "Nonsense, child," said my father, smiling. "Did you ever see a stone thrown into the pond? there's a great splash, and a few circles on the water, and that's about all, isn't it? Well, when I die there'll be a great splash of tears and hullaballooing, and a few circles of tender recollections, and...1867, Rhoda Broughton, Cometh Up as a Flower: An Autobiography, volume I, London: Richard Bentley, […], pages 53–54
hullabaloo meaning in Hindi, Marathi, Urdu and Malayalam
hullabaloo in Hindi
- hullabaloo, commotion, clamour
- हाहाकार hāhākār
hullabaloo in Marathi
- hullabaloo, commotion, clamour
- हाहाकार hāhākār
hullabaloo in Urdu
- غل غپاڑا, ہلا گلا, شورغوغا
hullabaloo in Malayalam
- hue and cry, fuss, commotion
- ഒച്ചയും ബഹളവും, തിരക്ക്, ബഹളം, ഒച്ചപ്പാട്, ഒച്ച, കുഴപ്പം
More languagesFewer languages
- hullabaloo in Kannada
- ಗಲಭೆ, ಹುಯ್ಲು, ಗದ್ದಲ, ಕೋಲಾಹಲ
- hullabaloo in Arabic
- جَلَبَة jalaba
Synonyms of hullabaloo
30 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Forms of hullabaloo
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | hullabaloos |
| alternative form | hallaballoo |
| alternative form | hallabaloo |
| alternative form | hulabaloo |
| alternative form | hullaballoo |
| alternative form | hellaballoo |
| alternative form | hellabaloo |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | hullabaloos |
| present participle | hullabalooing |
| past participle | hullabalooed |
| past | hullabalooed |
Origin of hullabaloo
Possibly a rhyming reduplication of halloo (used as a greeting or to catch attention; used in hunting to urge on pursuers), hilloa, hullo (variants of “hello”), and similar words.
Questions about hullabaloo
- What does hullabaloo mean?
- Hullabaloo means a clamour, a commotion; a fuss or uproar.
- What is hullabaloo in Hindi?
- Hullabaloo in Hindi is हाहाकार (hāhākār). See Hullabaloo meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is hullabaloo?
- Hullabaloo can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce hullabaloo?
- Hullabaloo is pronounced /ˌhʌləbəˈluː/ (UK).
- What is the plural of hullabaloo?
- The plural of hullabaloo is hullabaloos.
Words near hullabaloo in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: hullabaloo (page history and authors); हाहाकार (Hindi) (page history and authors); हाहाकार (Marathi) (page history and authors); hullabaloo (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); hullabaloo (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); hullabaloo (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-us-hullabaloo.ogg, En-au-hullabaloo.ogg.
Cite this entry: “hullabaloo.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/hullabaloo. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.