toil

• toyle (obsolete)

From Middle English toilen, toylen, apparently a conflation of Anglo-Norman toiller (“to agitate, stir up, entangle”) (compare Old Northern French tooillier, tooullier (“to agitate, stir”); of unknown origin), and Middle English tilyen, telien, teolien, tolen, tolien, tulien (“to till, work, labour”), from Old English tilian, telian, teolian, tiolian (“to exert oneself, toil, work, make, generate, strive after, try, endeavor, procure, obtain, gain, provide, tend, cherish, cultivate, till, plough, trade, traffic, aim at, aspire to, treat, cure”) (compare Middle Dutch tuylen, teulen (“to till, work, labour”)), from Proto-Germanic *tilōną (“to strive, reach for, aim for, hurry”). Cognate with Scots tulyie (“to quarrel, flite, contend”).

An alternate etymology derives Middle English toilen, toylen directly from Middle Dutch tuylen, teulen (“to work, labour, till”), from tuyl ("agriculture, labour, toil"; > Modern Dutch tuil (“toil; work”)). Cognate with Old Frisian teula (“to labour, toil”), teule (“labour, work”), Dutch tuil (“toil, labour”). Compare also Dutch telen (“to grow; raise; cultivate, till”). More at till.

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔɪl, -ɔɪəl

toil (countable and uncountable, plural toils)

1. Labour, work, especially of a grueling nature.

   Synonyms: derve, drudgery, swink; see also Thesaurus:drudgery

   • 1908, Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows:

     […] he set to work again and made the snow fly in all directions around him. After some further toil his efforts were rewarded, and a very shabby door-mat lay exposed to view.

2. Trouble, strife.
3. (usually in the plural) A net or snare; any thread, web, or string spread for taking prey.
   • 1697, Virgil, John Dryden, transl., Georgics:

     Then toils for beasts, and lime for birds, were found.

   • 1823, Mary Shelley, Frankenstein:

     I was like a wild beast that had broken the toils, destroying the objects that obstructed me and ranging through the wood with a stag-like swiftness.

• toiler

toil (third-person singular simple present toils, present participle toiling, simple past and past participle toiled)

1. (intransitive) To labour; work.
2. (intransitive) To struggle.
3. (transitive) To work (something); often with out.
   • (Can we date this quote?) Holland

     places well toiled and husbanded

   • (Can we date this quote?) John Milton

     [I] toiled out my uncouth passage.

4. (transitive) To weary through excessive labour.
   • (Can we date this quote?) William Shakespeare

     toiled with works of war

• toil and moil

• “toil” in Douglas Harper, Online Etymology Dictionary, 2001–2019.

• -itol, loti

toil

1. conger eel

From Old Irish tol (“will, desire”).

• (Cois Fharraige) IPA^(key): /t̪ˠɪlʲ/

toil f (genitive singular tola)

1. will

• le do thoil
• más é do thoil é

• “tol” in Dictionary of the Irish Language, Royal Irish Academy, 1913–76.
• “toil” in Foclóir Gaeḋilge agus Béarla, Irish Texts Society, 2nd ed., 1927, by Patrick S. Dinneen.
• "toil" in Foclóir Gaeilge-Béarla, An Gúm, 1977, by Niall Ó Dónaill.

From Old Irish tol (“will, desire”).

• IPA^(key): [t̪ɔl], /t̪ʰɔl/

toil f (genitive singular toile, plural toilean)

1. will, desire, volition, inclination
2. delight, pleasure

• Is toil leam (“I like”)
• Toil Dé (“The will of God”)
• Mas e do thoil e (“please”)

• mì-thoil
• saor-thoil
• toileach

• Faclair Gàidhlig Dwelly Air Loidhne, Dwelly, Edward (1911), Faclair Gàidhlig gu Beurla le Dealbhan/The Illustrated [Scottish] Gaelic-English Dictionary (10th ed.), Edinburgh: Birlinn Limited, →ISBN
• “tol” in Dictionary of the Irish Language, Royal Irish Academy, 1913–76.