| hold up someone hold up (someone/something) 1. to delay someone or something. Traffic was held up for several hours by the accident. Sorry to hold you up, but my train was late. 2. to try to steal from a person or place by using violence. Two masked men held up the grocery store on my block. They held her up at gunpoint. 3. to offer someone or something as an example. Her parents always held her sister up as the kind of person she should be. |