pill

Meanings

Noun

• A small, usually round or cylindrical object designed for easy swallowing, usually containing some sort of medication.
• Contraceptive medication, usually in the form of a pill to be taken by a woman; an oral contraceptive pill.
• Something offensive, unpleasant or nauseous which must be accepted or endured.
• A contemptible, annoying, or unpleasant person.
• A comical or entertaining person.
• A small piece of any substance, for example a ball of fibres formed on the surface of a textile by rubbing.
• A baseball.
• A bullet .
• A rounded rectangle indicating the tag or category that an item belongs to.
• The peel or skin.
• An inlet on the coast; a small tidal pool or bay.

Verb

• Of a woven fabric surface, to form small matted balls of fiber.
• To form into the shape of a pill.
• To medicate with pills.
• To persuade or convince someone of something.
• To blackball (a potential club member).
• To peel; to remove the outer layer of hair, skin, or bark.
• To peel; to make by removing the skin.
• To be peeled; to peel off in flakes.
• To pillage; to despoil or impoverish.

Related

Similar words

• tablet
• cap

Origin

• From Middle English pille (also pillem), a borrowing from Middle Low German pille or Middle Dutch pille (whence Dutch pil), probably from Latin pila, pilula.
• Generalized from red pill.
• From Latin pilō ("depilate"), from pilus. peel.
• From Middle English *pill, *pyll, from Old English pyll ("a pool, pill"), from Proto-Germanic *pullijaz ("small pool, ditch, creek"), diminutive of Proto-Germanic *pullaz ("pool, stream"), from Proto-Indo-European *bl̥nos ("bog, marsh"). Cognate with Old English pull ("pool, creek"), Scots poll ("slow moving stream, creek, inlet"), Icelandic pollur ("pond, pool, puddle"). More at pool.