hold-up

See also: holdup, and hold up

English

Etymology

Deverbal from hold up.

Noun

hold-up (plural hold-ups)

1. (colloquial) A delay or wait.

   Synonyms: cunctation, holdoff; see also Thesaurus:delay

   What is the hold-up?

2. A robbery at gunpoint.

   Synonyms: armed robbery, stickup

   This is a hold-up! Give us all your money.

   • 1961 November 10, Joseph Heller, “The Soldier in White”, in Catch-22 […], New York, N.Y.: Simon and Schuster, →OCLC, page 168:

     They didn't get shot to death in hold-ups, strangled to death in rapes, stabbed to death in saloons, bludgeoned to death with axes by parents or children or die summarily by some other act of God.

3. (bridge) The holding back of a card that could win a trick in order to use it later.
   • 1974, Terence Reese, Master Play in Contract Bridge, page 75:

     This was another hand on which a holdup caused declarer to lose control and to go down in a sensational way: […]

   • 2014, Nicolae Sfetcu, The Bridge Game:

     In a holdup, a player delays taking a trick until opponents' entries are reduced.

4. (in the plural) Women's stockings designed to be worn without suspenders.
5. (military) The inventory of nuclear material within a separation plant.
   • 1978, United States. Congress. House. Committee on Armed Services. Intelligence and Military Application of Nuclear Energy Subcommittee, Hearings on H.R. 11036 (H.R. 11686) (page 361)

     And to the left is a portable gamma counter that tells us the holdup of plutonium recovery facilities.

   • 1989, Energy Research Abstracts, page 2046:

     During process operations and temporary shutdown, the holdup within the facility is also known as the in-process inventory.

6. (Nigeria) A traffic jam.

Derived terms

• hold-up squad

 

Descendants

• → Cebuano: holdap
• → French: hold-up
• → Tagalog: holdap

Translations

a delay or wait

• German: Verzögerung (de) f, Stillstand (de) m, Stockung f, Aufhalten n
• Polish: poślizg (pl) m

a robbery at gunpoint

• Bulgarian: грабеж (bg) m (grabež)
• Finnish: ryöstö (fi)
• French: hold-up (fr) m
• German: bewaffneter Raubüberfall m
• Italian: rapina (it) f
• Portuguese: latrocínio (pt)
• Russian: грабёж (ru) m (grabjóž), налёт (ru) m (naljót), разбой (ru) m (razboj) (formal)
• Swedish: rån (sv) n

(in the plural) Women's stockings designed to be worn without suspenders

• Italian: autoreggente (it) m

Anagrams

• Uphold, uphold

French

Alternative forms

• holdup

Etymology

Borrowed from English hold-up.

Pronunciation

• Audio:

  (file)

• ^{(aspirated h)} IPA^(key): /ɔl.dœp/

• Audio:

  (file)

Noun

hold-up m (plural hold-up)

1. hold-up (robbery)
   • 1968, Serge Gainsbourg (lyrics and music), “Hold Up”, in Initials B.B., performed by Serge Gainsbourg ft. Madeline Bell:

     Je suis venu pour te voler / Cent millions de baisers / […] / C’est un hold-up ! / Eh ouais, c’est un hold-up !

     I came to steal / a hundred million kisses from you / […] / This is a hold-up! / Oh yes, it's a hold-up!

Further reading

• “hold-up”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.