Etymology From Middle English snivelen, snevelen, snyvelen, snuvelen, from Old English *snyflan (attested in the verbal noun snyflung (“mucus”)), from Proto-West Germanic *snuflijan, related to Old English snofl (“mucus”), ultimately from the root of snout. Akin to sniff, snuff. Compare sniffle. Cognate with Middle Low German snuffelen, snüffelen (“to sniff, smell”), Danish snøvle (“to sniffle, snivel”), Norwegian Nynorsk snuvla (“to sniffle, snivel”), Swedish snövla (“to sniffle, snivel”). Compare typologically Russian сопе́ть (sopétʹ), сопля́ (sopljá) akinness.
1
To breathe heavily through the nose while it is congested with nasal mucus.
With stinking breath, swart-cheeks, and hanging chaps; With wrinkled neck; and stooping as she goes, With driveling mouth, and with a sniveling nose.1611, Josuah Sylvester (translator), Du Bartas His Deuine Weekes and Workes, London, Book 4, Week 2, Day 4, p. 623, […] a Hagg, a Fury by my side; With hollow, yellow teeth (or none perhaps)
1794, Erasmus Darwin, Zoonomia, London: J. Johnson, Volume 1, Section 16, Subsection 2, p. 149, […] in severe frosty weather, snivelling and tears are produced by the coldness and dryness of the air.
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[…] he began to snivel, and wherever he tried to hide he was found out by the terrific explosions of his suppressed sneezes.1937, J. R. R. Tolkien, chapter 9, in The Hobbit, New York: Random House, published 1982, page 187:
2
Derogatory To cry while sniffling; to whine or complain while crying.
Let things come to the Worst; when we have Overturned the Government;—Polluted the very Altar, with our MASTERS BLOOD—Cheated the Publick, &c. ’Tis but to Whine and Snivel to the People; tell them we were mis-led, by Cardinall Appetites;1660, Roger L’Estrange, “No Fool to the Old Fool”, in A Short View of Some Remarkable Transactions, London: Henry Brome, page 95:
[…] after a good deal of sniveling and sobbing, she owned, that so far from being an heiress of a great fortune, she was no other than a common woman of the town, who had decoyed me into matrimony […]1748, Tobias Smollett, chapter 61, in The Adventures of Roderick Random, volume 2, London: J. Osborn, page 267:
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I never snivel over trifles like that.1868, Louisa May Alcott, chapter 15, in Little Women:
ANNE: Aunt Sara’s in the garden, snivelling in a deck chair. BASTON: What a hard child you are. ANNE: It’s no good being mushy, is it? It’s the truth that matters. and she is snivelling. BASTON: You could have said “crying.” ANNE: But crying’s quite a different thing.1957, Graham Greene, The Potting Shed, New York: Viking, act 1, scene 1, page 17:
3
Derogatory To say (something) while sniffling or crying.
This bye dialogue prevented my hearing what passed between the prisoner and Captain Thornton, but I heard the former snivel out, in a very subdued tone, “And ye’ll ask her to gang nae farther than just to shew ye where the MacGregor is?—Ohon! ohon!”1817 December 31 (indicated as 1818), [Walter Scott], chapter III, in Rob Roy. […], volume III, Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Co. […]; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, →OCLC, page 65:
I, the Socman, am shorn of my lands that you may snivel Latin and eat bread for which you never did hand’s turn.1891, Arthur Conan Doyle, chapter 9, in The White Company:
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‘Oh, hell! I’d snivel psalms to oblige the padre, but I can’t stick the way these damned native Christians come shoving into our church.’1934 October, George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], “Chapter 2”, in Burmese Days, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, Publishers, →OCLC:
Etymology From Middle English snivelen, snevelen, snyvelen, snuvelen, from Old English *snyflan (attested in the verbal noun snyflung (“mucus”)), from Proto-West Germanic *snuflijan, related to Old English snofl (“mucus”), ultimately from the root of snout. Akin to sniff, snuff. Compare sniffle. Cognate with Middle Low German snuffelen, snüffelen (“to sniff, smell”), Danish snøvle (“to sniffle, snivel”), Norwegian Nynorsk snuvla (“to sniffle, snivel”), Swedish snövla (“to sniffle, snivel”). Compare typologically Russian сопе́ть (sopétʹ), сопля́ (sopljá) akinness.
1
The act of snivelling.
So Parson Hugh, with Groan and Snivel Made half his Congregation drivel,1692, John Dennis, “The Triumvirate: or, The Battle”, in Poems in Burlesque, London, page 2:
[…] after a bit of a snivel, for you know I am a woman in these matters, I had her treated with all decency, and then committed her to Davy Jones’s locker; and for want of a chaplain, I said the burial service myself […]1792, Charles Dibdin, chapter 5, in Hannah Hewit: or, The Female Crusoe, volume 1, London, page 50:
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Order! No snivel!—no sentiment!—no regret! I will endure only sense and resolution.1847 October 16, Currer Bell [pseudonym; Charlotte Brontë], chapter XVI, in Jane Eyre. An Autobiography. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Smith, Elder, and Co., […], →OCLC:
Uriah Heep gave a kind of snivel. I think to express sympathy.1849 May – 1850 November, Charles Dickens, chapter 42, in The Personal History of David Copperfield, London: Bradbury & Evans, […], published 1850, →OCLC:
2
Nasal mucus; snot.
[A]nd if thou entreate me not the fayrer, (hope of amendment preventeth many ruines) truſt me, I will batter thy carrion to dirt, whence thou camſt, and ſquiſe thy braine to ſnivell whereof it was curdled; […]1593, Gabriell Haruey [i.e., Gabriel Harvey], Pierces Supererogation: Or A New Prayse of the Old Asse. A Preparative to Certaine Larger Discourses, Intituled Nashes S. Fame, London: […] Iohn Wolfe, →OCLC; republished as John Payne Collier, editor, Pierces Supererogation: Or A New Prayse of the Old Asse. […] (Miscellaneous Tracts. Temp. Eliz. & Jac. I; no. 8), [London]: [s.n.], [1870], →OCLC, page 155:
He did let his snot and snivel fall in his pottage […]1653, Thomas Urquhart, transl., The First Book of the Works of Mr. Francis Rabelais, London: Richard Baddeley, Book 1, Chapter 11, p. 53:
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1770, Thomas Bridges, A Burlesque Translation of Homer, London: S. Hooper, 3rd edition, Volume 2, Book 8, p. 44, In streams the blood and snivel flows From many a Grecian’s snotty nose,
On quitting this den of furious heat, I got a sight of a lair, exceeding all the rest I had seen in Hell, but one, in frightful stinking filthiness, where was a herd of accursed drunken swine, disgorging and swallowing, swallowing and disgorging, continually and without rest, the most loathsome snivel.1860, Ellis Wynne, translated by George Borrow, The Sleeping Bard; or, Visions of the World, Death, and Hell, London: John Murray, page 86:
[…] he ran his sleeve under his nose to stop the snivel.1952, Flannery O’Connor, chapter 3, in Wise Blood, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, published 1962, page 59: