Rumble: A Word Built Out of Its Own Sound
To rumble is to make a low continuous noise. The word imitates the sound, and in American slang it also means a street fight.
To rumble is to make a deep, rolling, continuous noise — thunder, an empty stomach, a lorry on a bad road. The word is onomatopoeic: it was assembled to sound like the thing it describes, and the doubled consonant in the middle does most of that work. English is full of these, but few survive as long or travel as far as this one.
- To make a low rolling sound. *Thunder rumbled offshore.*
- Of the stomach — to growl with hunger. *My stomach rumbled.*
- To move with that sound. *A tank rumbled past.*
- Slang, a street fight. *There was a rumble downtown.*
- British slang, to find out. *They rumbled his scheme.*
Word forms
| Form | Word | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Verb | rumble | Carts rumble by. |
| Past | rumbled | It rumbled all night. |
| Continuous | rumbling | A rumbling engine. |
| Noun | rumble | A distant rumble. |
| Related | grumble | He grumbled about it. |
- Thunder rumbled behind the hills.The core sense.
- His stomach rumbled through the whole lecture.Very common use.
- The gang was looking for a rumble.American slang, mid-1900s.
Sound words in the same family
- Grumble — complain in a low voice
- Mumble — speak indistinctly
- Tumble — fall end over end
- Jumble — mix without order
- The pattern — a root plus the frequentative ending -le, meaning repeated action
Middle English *romblen*, probably from Middle Dutch *rommelen*, imitating the sound. The -le ending marks repetition: a rumble is not one noise but a noise that keeps going.
Is rumble onomatopoeic?
Yes. Like buzz, hiss and crack, it was formed to resemble the sound it names.
What was a rumble seat?
An open folding seat behind the body of an early car, where passengers rode exposed and felt every bump.