noun, verb ·2 syllables ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   A musical instrument consisting of a wooden pipe, with holes at intervals.
2. 2
   a British solo dance performed by sailors wordnet
3. 3
   A solo dance commonly associated with seamen, involving kicking of the legs, with the arms mostly crossed.
4. 4
   an ancient (now obsolete) single-reed woodwind; usually made of bone wordnet
5. 5
   A hard-shoe solo dance commonly performed in Irish stepdance, usually danced in 2/4 time.

Show 2 more definitions

6. 6
   music for dancing the hornpipe wordnet
7. 7
   Music played to the hornpipe dance

Verb

1. 1
   To dance the hornpipe. intransitive

Synonyms

All synonyms

bassoonclarinetdanceenglish hornfifeflute

Example

More examples

"The jig, reel and hornpipe are the most popular Irish dances."

Etymology

From Middle English hornpipe, hornpype, hornepipe, equivalent to horn + pipe; so called because the bell at the open end was sometimes made of horn.

Related phrases

irish stepdancemusical instrument

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.