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Glite Dictionary
hold-up

hold-up

8 5.4
A robbery using threats or a sudden delay
  • noun
  • /ˈhoʊldˌʌp/
: robo
  • If we wanted to, we can trace them both back to those jewelry store hold-ups.
  • bank hold-ups

So alright, if you're ready then what's the hold up?

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Examples

  • I'm not sure what the hold-up is.

    Blog text (25)

  • C'mon big boy, what's the hold-up?

    Fiction book (1999)

  • - There's been a hold up at the bank.

    Dead Heat on a Merry-Go-Round (1966)

  • Has there been a hold-up or something?

    Big City (1937)

  • I wanted to know what the hold-up was.

    Blog text (34)

  • So what's the hold-up in Congress?

    Blog text (5)

  • I'd just like to say that this is a hold-up.

    Boxcar Bertha (1972)

  • The things they'd brought off: robberies, bank hold-ups.

    Fiction book (1994)

  • What's the hold-up, Peters?

    Event Horizon (1997)

  • There was a dramatic hold-up at the bank, and armed robbers demanded cash from the tellers.

Synonyms

robbery
vshold-up
631 2.3

Stealing things from people and places such as shops and banks using force or threats

adds a secondary meaning for an unexpected delay besides theft
holdup
vshold-up
  • US
9 4.6

An act of stealing from someone by using threats or a weapon

has identical robbery sense but also refers to an unexpected delay
stickup
vshold-up
  • NSFW
5 7.9

A robbery in which people are forced to give money, often with a gun

can also mean an unplanned delay not only violent theft

Antonyms

smoothness
4 2.6

How something works without pauses or problems

How Serious

armed robbery
  • NSFW
87 3.2
robbery
631 2.3
hold-up
8 5.4
delay
405 1.3
interruption
88 3.0

Surface Forms

hold-up singular
hold-ups plural

Morphology

hold-up = hold (opaque) = up + hold

The phrase 'hold-up' has evolved to mean 'robbery' or 'delay', which is not directly derivable from 'hold' and 'up'. [Postprocessing: moved 'up' from base_words to prefix]

Etymology

The word hold-up comes from the phrase hold up, which means 'stop' or 'keep in place'. Imagine someone holding you at gunpoint to stop you, or a broken bridge that holds up traffic, and that's why a hold-up can be a robbery or an unexpected delay.