gall
/ɡɔːl/ noun, verb, proper noun
- noun (uncountable) Impudence or brazenness; temerity; chutzpah.
- noun (anatomy, archaic, countable) A gallbladder.
- noun (physiology, archaic, uncountable) Bile, especially that of an animal; the greenish, profoundly bitter-tasting fluid found in bile ducts and gall bladders, structures associated with the liver.
- noun (figurative, uncountable) Great misery or physical suffering, likened to the bitterest-tasting of substances.
- noun (countable) A sore on a horse caused by an ill-fitted or ill-adjusted saddle; a saddle sore.
- noun (pathology, countable) A sore or open wound caused by chafing, which may become infected, as with a blister.
- noun (figurative, uncountable) A feeling of exasperation.
- noun (countable, technical) A pit on a surface being cut caused by the friction between the two surfaces exceeding the bond of the material at a point.
- verb (ergative) To chafe, to rub or subject to friction; to create a sore on the skin.
- verb (transitive, figurative) To bother or trouble.
- verb (transitive, figurative) To harass, to harry, often with the intent to cause injury.
- verb (transitive, figurative) To exasperate.
- verb (transitive, technical) To cause pitting on a surface being cut from the friction between the two surfaces exceeding the bond of the material at a point. “Improper cooling and a dull milling cutter on titanium can gall the surface.”
- verb (intransitive, obsolete, rare) To scoff; to jeer.
- noun (phytopathology) A blister or tumor-like growth found on the surface of plants, caused by various pathogens, especially the burrowing of insect larvae into the living tissues, such as that of the common oak gall wasp (Cynips quercusfolii).
- noun A bump-like imperfection resembling a gall.
- verb (transitive) To impregnate with a decoction of gallnuts in dyeing.
- proper noun A surname.
Synonyms
rankle nutgall saddle sore resentment bitterness rancor rancour bile crust impertinence impudence insolence cheekiness freshness chafe fret irk
Etymology
From Middle English galle, from Old English ġealla, galla, from Proto-West Germanic *gallā, from Proto-Germanic *gallǭ.
The figurative senses (e.g., impudence, brazenness, chutzpah) are related to the literal sense (i.e., bile) via the lasting linguocultural effects of humorism, which governed Western medicine for many centuries before the advent of scientific medicine.
Related to Dutch gal, German Galle, Swedish galle, galla, Ancient Greek χολή (kholḗ). Also remotely related with yellow and gold.
From Middle English galle, from Old English gealla (“a fretted spot on the skin”), from Proto-West Germanic *gallō, from Proto-Germanic *gallô (“infirmity, swelling, lesion”).
From Middle English galle, from Old French galle, from Latin galla (“oak-apple”).
* As an English, Scottish Gaelic, and Irish surname, of Celtic origin, from Gall (“foreigner”). This is in turn from Latin Gallus, which has borrowings (many of which are surnames) in several European languages, such as Czech Havel, Polish Gawel.
* As a Hungarian surname, variant of Gál, itself from the Latin word.
Webster’s 1913
- noun The bitter, alkaline, viscid fluid found in the gall bladder, beneath the liver. It consists of the secretion of the liver, or bile, mixed with that of the mucous membrane of the gall bladder.
- noun The gall bladder.
- noun An excrescence of any form produced on any part of a plant by insects or their larvae. They are most commonly caused by small Hymenoptera and Diptera which puncture the bark and lay their eggs in the wounds. The larvae live within the galls. Some galls are due to aphids, mites, etc. See Gallnut.
- verb To impregnate with a decoction of gallnuts. Ure.
Etymology [OE. galle, gal, AS. gealla; akin to D. gal, OS. & OHG. galla, Icel. gall, SW. galla, Dan. galde, L. fel, Gr. yellow. Yellow, and cf. Choler]
Etymology [F. galle, noix de galle, fr. L. galla.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “gall”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details