troll

• (UK) enPR: trōl, IPA^(key): /tɹəʊl/; enPR: trŏl, IPA^(key): /tɹɒl/
• (US) enPR: trōl, IPA^(key): /tɹoʊl/

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -əʊl, -ɒl

From Norwegian or Swedish troll or Danish trold, from Old Norse trǫll (“witch, mage, conjurer”) (compare Icelandic tröll), related to Middle High German trolle (“spook, wraith, monster, ogre”).[1] From Proto-Germanic *truzlą (“a supernatural being; demon; fiend; giant; monster”). Norwegian fortrylle (“to bewitch”), Norwegian and Danish trylle (“to conjure”) and Swedish trolla (“to conjure”).

troll (plural trolls)

1. (fantasy) A supernatural being of varying size, now especially a grotesque humanoid creature living in caves or hills or under bridges. [from early 17th c.]
   • 1922, Eleanour Sinclair Rohde, The Old English Herbals, page 3:

     In these manuscripts we are again in an atmosphere of eotens and trolls, there are traces of even older terrors, when the first Teuton settlers in Europe struggled with the aborigines who lived in caves[.]

   • 2013 June 8, “Obama goes troll-hunting”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8839, page 55:

     The solitary, lumbering trolls of Scandinavian mythology would sometimes be turned to stone by exposure to sunlight. Barack Obama is hoping that several measures announced on June 4th will have a similarly paralysing effect on their modern incarnation, the patent troll.

2. (slang) An ugly person of either sex, especially one seeking sexual experiences.
3. (astronomy, meteorology) Optical ejections from the top of the electrically active core regions of thunderstorms that are red in color that seem to occur after tendrils of vigorous sprites extend downward toward the cloud tops.

1. trolless

From Middle English troll (“to go about, stroll, roll from side to side”), from Old French troller (“to quest, to wander”) (French trôler), of Germanic origin, ultimately from Proto-Germanic *truzlōną (“to lumber”), related to Middle High German trollen (“to stroll”), Middle Low German drullen (“to stroll”); fishing sense possibly influenced by trawl and/or trail

troll (third-person singular simple present trolls, present participle trolling, simple past and past participle trolled)

1. (intransitive) To saunter. [from late 14th c.]
2. (intransitive) To trundle, to roll from side to side. [from early 15th c.]
3. (transitive, figuratively) To draw someone or something out, to entice, to lure as if with trailing bait. [from the 1500s]

   1906, Thomas William Lawson, “Fools and Their Money: Some After-Claps of Frenzied Finance”, in Everybody's Magazine, volume XIV(5) May 1906, page 690:

   It was necessary to troll them along two years with the hope of employing their usual methods, in order to get them to a place too far from their starting-point for retreat.

4. (intransitive, fishing, by extension) To fish using a line and bait or lures trailed behind a boat similarly to trawling; to lure fish with bait. [from circa 1600]
   • (Can we date this quote?) Bancroft

     Their young men […] trolled along the brooks that abounded in fish.

5. (transitive) To angle for with a trolling line, or with a hook drawn along the surface of the water; hence, to allure.
6. (transitive) To fish in; to try to catch fish from.
   • (Can we date this quote?) Goldsmith

     With patient angle trolls the finny deep.

7. (slang, intransitive) To stroll about in order to find a sexual partner, to cruise [from 20th c.]

   He spends most of his waking hours trolling on WIRE.

8. (intransitive, Internet slang) (to post inflammatory material so as) to attempt to lure others into combative argument for purposes of personal entertainment and/or gratuitous disruption, especially in an online community or discussion [from late 20th c.]
   • 1993 October 11, “danny burstein” (username), “I trolled, and no one bit!”, in alt.folklore.urban, Usenet
9. (transitive, Internet slang) By extension, to incite anger (including outside of an Internet context); to provoke, harass or annoy.
   • 1994 March 8, “Robert Royar” (username), “OK, here's more on trolling”, in comp.edu.composition, Usenet:

     trolling isn't aimed at newbies. It's aimed at self-important people

troll (plural trolls)

1. An instance of trolling, especially, in fishing, the trailing of a baited line. [from circa 1600]
2. (colloquial, Internet slang) A person who provokes others (chiefly on the Internet) for their own personal amusement or to cause disruption. [from late 20th c.]

• griefer

From Middle English trollen, trollin (“to walk, wander”). Cognate with Low German trullen (“to troll”).

troll (third-person singular simple present trolls, present participle trolling, simple past and past participle trolled)

1. (transitive, intransitive, obsolete) To move circularly; to roll; to turn. [from the 15th c.]
   • (Can we date this quote?) Milton

     to dress and troll the tongue, and roll the eye

2. (transitive, obsolete) To send about; to circulate, as a vessel in drinking.
   • (Can we date this quote?) Gammer Gurton's Needle

     Then doth she troll to the bowl.

   • (Can we date this quote?) Sir Walter Scott

     Troll the brown bowl.

3. (transitive, intransitive, archaic) To sing the parts of in succession, as of a round, a catch, and the like; also, to sing loudly, freely or in a carefree way. [from the 16th c.]
   • c. 1610-11, William Shakespeare, The Tempest, Act III scene ii:

     […] Will you troll the catch / You taught me but whilere?

   • (Can we date this quote?) Hudibras

     His sonnets charmed the attentive crowd, / By wide-mouthed mortal trolled aloud.

   • 1862, Thomas Oliphant, Nos Galan

     Troul the ancient Christmas carol.

   • 1883, Howard Pyle, The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood Chapter V

     Next, he opened his stall and spread his meat upon the bench, then, taking his cleaver and steel and clattering them together, he trolled aloud in merry tones: […]

troll (plural trolls)

1. The act of moving round; routine; repetition.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Burke to this entry?)

2. A song whose parts are sung in succession; a catch; a round.
   • (Can we date this quote?) Professor Wilson

     Thence the catch and troll, while "Laughter, holding both his sides," sheds tears to song and ballad pathetic on the woes of married life.

3. (obsolete) A trolley.

• troll plate

• IPA^(key): /tʁɔl/

From Swedish troll, from Old Norse troll, from Proto-Germanic *truzlą, from Proto-Indo-European *derǝ-, *drā-.

troll m (plural trolls)

1. troll (mythical being)

Borrowed from English troll.

troll m (plural trolls)

1. troll (inflammatory poster on the Internet)
2. (by extension) The act of trolling.

• “troll” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

troll m (invariable)

1. troll (grotesque person, Internet troll)

• trollare

From Old Norse trǫll, from Proto-Germanic *truzlą, from Proto-Indo-European *derǝ-, *drā-.

• IPA^(key): /trol/, [tɾɔl]
• Rhymes: -ɔl

troll n (definite singular trollet, indefinite plural troll, definite plural trolla or trollene)

1. troll (supernatural being)

• “troll” in The Bokmål Dictionary.

From Old Norse trǫll, from Proto-Germanic *truzlą, from Proto-Indo-European *derǝ-, *drā-.

• IPA^(key): /trɔlː/

troll n (definite singular trollet, indefinite plural troll, definite plural trolla)

1. troll (supernatural being)
   • 1856, Ivar Aasen, Norske Ordsprog:

     Dat eine Trollet skræmer inkje dat andre.

     The one troll does not scare the other.

• trollbinde
• trollkjerring

• “troll” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

• trol

troll m (plural trolls)

1. (fantasy, Norse mythology) troll (large, grotesque humanoid living in caves, hills or under bridges)
2. (Internet) troll (person who provokes others and causes disruption)

troll m (plural trolls)

1. Alternative spelling of trol

From Old Norse trǫll, from Proto-Germanic *truzlą, from Proto-Indo-European *derǝ-, *drā-.

• IPA^(key): /trɔl/

• Audio

  (file)

troll n

1. troll (supernatural being)

• förtrolla
• trolla
• trolldom
• trolldryck
• trollkarl
• trollkona
• trollkongen (Dovregubben)
• trollkonst
• trollkonstnär
• trollkärring
• trollunge