Haver

Pronunciation

• Hyphenation: ha + ver
• Rhymes: -eɪvÉ™(r)

Borrowing from sco haiver.

Full definition of haver

Verb

1. (British) To hem and haw
• 1988, Alan Hollinghurst, , Penguin Books, paperback edition, page 154This didn't seem at all unlikely, but when I none the less havered, he insisted that his 'Egyptian fortune-teller' had confirmed it.
2. (Scotland), Usually haiver. To maunder; to talk foolishly; to chatter; talking nonsense; to babble
• 1988, The Proclaimers, And if I haver, yeah I know I’m gonna be
  I’m gonna be the man who’s havering to you.
• 2004 James Campbell, "Boswell and Mrs. Miller", in The Genius of Language (ed. Wendy Lesser), p. 194She havers on about her "faither" and "mirra" and the "wee wean," her child, and "hoo i wiz glaiket but bonny forby."

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -eɪvÉ™(r)

Borrowing from sco haver, from Middle English haver, from Old Norse hafri ("oat, oats"), from Proto-Germanic *habrô ("oat, oats"), from Proto-Indo-European *kapro- ("goat"). Cognate with Dutch haver ("oats"), cognate with German Hafer ("oat").

Noun

1. (UK, Scotland, dialect) The cereal oats.

have + -er

Noun

1. One who has, possesses etc.
• 1608, Shakespeare, ''It is held
  That valour is the chiefest virtue, and
  Most dignifies the haver: if it be,
  The man I speak of cannot in the world
  Be singly counterpoised.

Synonyms

• holder
• possessor