vole

Meanings

Noun

• Any of a large number of species of small rodents of the subfamily Arvicolinae of the family Cricetidae which are not lemmings or muskrats.
• A deal in a card game, écarté, that draws all the tricks.

Verb

• To win all the tricks by a vole.

Origin

• Borrowed from Norn vollj, from Old Norse vǫllr ("field"), q.v. The Orkney dialectal name vole mouse, lit. "field mouse", was introduced to general English by George Barry in 1805; John Fleming in 1828 was first to refer to the creature by the epithet vole alone. Displaced earlier names for these species which also classified them as mice, e.g. short-tailed field mouse.
• French