• IPA: /pɹaɪ/

The verb is inherited from Middle English prien, pryen [and other forms], from Old English *prīwan, *prēowian, attested by Old English beprīwan, beprēwan; further etymology unknown, but probably akin to Old English *prēowot, attested only in combination – compare prēowthwīl, princ: see prink.

The noun is derived from the verb.

pry (pries, present participle prying; simple past and past participle pried)

1. (intransitive)
   1. To peer closely and curiously, especially at something closed or not public.
      • 1599 (first performance), [Thomas Dekker, Henry Chettle, William Houghton], The Pleasant Comodie of Patient Grissill. […], London: […] Henry Rocket, […], published 1603; republished Erlangen, Bavaria: […] Fr. Junge (Junge & Sohn), 1893, →OCLC ↗, page 11 ↗, lines 293–294:

        [W]omen haue eagles eyes, / To prie euen to the heart, and why not you?

      • 1667, John Milton, “Book VIII ↗”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC ↗; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC ↗, lines 158–161:

        […] to elude, thus wrapt in miſt / Of midnight vapor glide obſcure, and prie / In every Buſh and brake, where hap may finde / The Serpent ſleeping, […]

      • 1815, William Wordsworth, “Canto First”, in The White Doe of Rylstone; or The Fate of the Nortons. A Poem, London: […] [James Ballantyne and Co. for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […], →OCLC ↗, page 19 ↗:

        And choice of studious friends had he / Of Bolton's dear fraternity: / […] / [I]n their cells with him did pry / For other lore,—through strong desire / Searching the earth with chemic fire: […]

   2. (figuratively) To inquire into something that does not concern one; to be nosy; to snoop.
      • 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act I, scene i], page 122 ↗, column 1:

        Watch thou, and wake when others be aſleepe, / To prie into the ſecrets of the State, […]

      • 1908, E[dward] M[organ] Forster, “Possibilities of a Pleasant Outing”, in A Room with a View, London: Edward Arnold, →OCLC ↗, part I, page 73 ↗:

        We literary hacks are shameless creatures. I believe there's no secret of the human heart into which we wouldn't pry.

2. (transitive, obsolete) To peer at (something) closely; also, to look into (a matter, etc.) thoroughly.
   • 1850, Herman Melville, “Night and Day Gambling in a Man-of-War”, in White-Jacket; or, The World in a Man-of-War, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, publishers; London: Richard Bentley, published 1855, →OCLC ↗, page 357 ↗:

     The two ship's corporals went among the sailors by the names of Leggs and Pounce; […] Bland, the master-at-arms, ravished with their dexterity in prying out offenders, used to call them his two right hands.

• French: fureter, fouiller, scruter
• German: genau hinsehen, genau nachsehen
• Italian: sbirciare
• Spanish: husmear

• French: s'immiscer
• German: schnüffeln
• Italian: intrudere
• Portuguese: bisbilhotar, xeretar
• Russian: подсма́тривать
• Spanish: entremeter (pronominal), fisgar, fisgonear, hurgar

pry (plural pries)

1. An act of prying; a close and curious look.

   Synonyms: prying

   • 1817 March 3, John Keats, “[Poems.] To ****”, in Poems, London: […] [Charles Richards] for C[harles] & J[ames] Ollier, […], →OCLC ↗; reprinted in Poems (The Noel Douglas Replicas), London: Noel Douglas, 1927, →OCLC ↗, stanza 1, page 37 ↗:

     With those beauties, scarce discern'd, / Kept with such sweet privacy, / That they seldom meet the eye / Of the little loves that fly / Round about with eager pry.

2. A person who is very inquisitive or nosy; a busybody, a nosey parker.

   Synonyms: Paul Pry

• Paul Pry (predates sense 2)

The noun is probably a back-formation from prise, prize, construed as the plural of pry.

The verb is either derived from the noun, or is a back-formation from prise (“to force open with a lever”), construed as pries, the third-person singular present form of pry.

pry (plural pries)

1. (East Anglia, US) A tool for levering; a crowbar, a lever.

   Synonyms: prise, prize, prybar, pry bar

• German: Hebel
• Russian: рыча́г

pry (pries, present participle prying; simple past and past participle pried) (transitive)

1. To use leverage to open, raise, or widen (something); to prise or prize.
   • 1850, Herman Melville, “A Dish of Dunderfunk”, in White-Jacket; or, The World in a Man-of-War, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, publishers; London: Richard Bentley, published 1855, →OCLC ↗, page 158 ↗:

     "Oh! he's going home to Down East," said another; "so far eastward, you know, shippy, that they have to pry up the sun with a handspike."

2. (figuratively) Usually followed by out (of): to draw out or get (information, etc.) with effort.

• German: aufhebeln
• Spanish: hacer palanca, abrir palanqueando, abrir apalacando

• As an Irish - surname, spelling variant of Prey, from Ó Préith.
• As a German - surname, a spelling variant of Prey, from breu; see brauen.

1. Surname.