hail

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
hail1

▶noun

• 1 pellets of frozen rain falling in showers from cumulonimbus clouds.

• 2 a large number of things hurled forcefully through the air: a hail of bullets.

▶verb (it hails, it is hailing, etc.) hail falls.

– origin OE hagol, hægl (n.), hagalian (v.), of Gmc origin.

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
hail2

▶verb

• 1 call out to (someone) to attract attention.

  ■ signal for (a taxi).

• 2 acclaim enthusiastically as something: he has been hailed as the new James Dean.

• 3 (hail from) have one's home or origins in.

▶exclamation archaic expressing greeting or acclaim. ▶noun a call to attract attention.

– phrases
within hail dated within calling distance.

– derivatives
hailer noun.

– origin ME: from the obs. adj. hail ‘healthy’ (used in greetings and toasts), from ON heill, rel. to hale1 and whole.