earball

See also: ear ball

English

Alternative forms

• ear ball

Etymology

From ear +‎ ball. Noun sense 1 and verb sense 1 is modeled after eyeball.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈɪə.bɔːl/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈɪəɹ.bɔl/
  • (cot–caught merger) IPA^(key): /ˈɪəɹ.bɑl/

• Audio (General American):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɪə(ɹ)bɔːl
• Hyphenation: ear‧ball

Noun

earball (plural earballs)

2. (humorous, usually in the plural) The ear. [from late 1840s]

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:ear

   to keep one's earballs open

   up to one's earballs

   My earballs hurt from listening to this.

   • 2010 October 28, Charlie Day & Rob McElhenney, “Who Got Dee Pregnant?” (10:50 from the start), in It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia‎, season 6, episode 7, spoken by Artemis Dubois (Artemis Pebdani):

     “All right, let's get back to Halloween. Anything else that happened that night-- like Deandra getting pregnant?” “Oh, well, that makes sense. Mac slept with her at the party.” “What?” “What are you talking about?” “I'm talking about the sounds of hot, passionate lovemaking... that was coming from the bathroom that I had heard with my own two ear-balls.”

   • 2011 April 21, Adam Reed, “Double Trouble” (1:52 from the start), in Archer‎, season 2, episode 13, spoken by Cheryl Tunt (Judy Greer):

     “Ha!” “Oh for-- why doesn't everybody just come in here?” “It's O.K., we can hear from out here!” “With our earballs!”

   • 2023 September 25, Deviant Ollam, 6:29 from the start, in Deviant's Travel Bag Breakdown (video), YouTube:

     I will occasionally put these [earbuds] in. We've talked occasionally on the channel about my hearing problems, and we'll do another video about protecting your earballs and such […]

   • 2023 December 26, @Clippers_steve, Twitter‎:

     Spotify won't miss tonight. Just fondling my earballs perfectly

   • 2025 January 7, @westeawest, Twitter‎:

     Is explode a transitive verb? It sounds weird to my earballs.

3. The act or an instance of listening.
4. (acupuncture) A small ball kept in position in the ear and pressed when needed to relieve stress. [from late 2000s]

Verb

earball (third-person singular simple present earballs, present participle earballing, simple past and past participle earballed)

2. (transitive) To listen, especially to check.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:listen

Further reading

• “earball”, in Collins English Dictionary.
• “earball”, in Dictionary.com Unabridged, Dictionary.com, LLC, 1995–present.
• “earball”, in TheFreeDictionary.com, Huntingdon Valley, Pa.: Farlex, Inc., 2003–2025

Anagrams

• bare all

Irish

Noun

earball m (genitive singular earbaill, nominative plural earbaill)

1. alternative form of eireaball

Declension

Declension of earball (first declension)

bare forms singular plural nominative earball earbaill vocative a earbaill a earballa genitive earbaill earball dative earball earbaill forms with the definite article singular plural nominative an t-earball na hearbaill genitive an earbaill na n-earball dative leis an earball don earball leis na hearbaill

Mutation

Mutated forms of earball

radical	eclipsis	with h-prothesis	with t-prothesis
earball	n-earball	hearball	t-earball

Note: Certain mutated forms of some words can never occur in standard Modern Irish.
All possible mutated forms are displayed for convenience.

Further reading

• Ó Dónaill, Niall (1977), “earball”, in Foclóir Gaeilge–Béarla, Dublin: An Gúm, →ISBN
• Dinneen, Patrick S. (1904), “earball”, in Foclóir Gaeḋilge agus Béarla, 1st edition, Dublin: Irish Texts Society, page 278