toil

English

Alternative forms

• toyle (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English toilen, toylen, apparently a conflation of Anglo-Norman toiler (“to agitate, stir up, entangle”) (compare Old Northern French toiller, touellier ("to agitate, stir"; of unknown origin)), and Middle English tilen, 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 *tilōnan (“to strive, reach for, aim for, hurry”). Cognate with Scots tulyie (“to quarrel, flite, contend”).

Alternate etymology derives Middle English toilen, toylen from Middle Dutch tuylen, teulen (“to work, labour, till”), from tuyl (“agriculture, labour, toil”). Cognate with Old Frisian teula (“to labour, toil”), Old Frisian teule (“labour, work”). More at till.

Pronunciation

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔɪl
• Rhymes: -ɔɪəl

Noun

toil (plural toils)

1. labour, work
   • 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. A net or snare; any thread, web, or string spread for taking prey; usually in the plural.
   • Denham

     As a Numidian lion, when first caught, / Endures the toil that holds him.

   • Dryden

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

Translations

labor, work

• Catalan: treball (ca)
• Czech: dřina (cs) f
• Dutch: gezwoeg (nl) n
• Finnish: ahkerointi (fi), uurastus (fi)
• Greek: κόπος (el) (kópos) m, μόχθος (el) (móchthos) m

• Italian: lavoro (it) m
• Russian: труд (ru) (trud) m, работа (ru) (rabóta) f
• Serbo-Croatian: rabota (sh) f

trouble, strife

• Finnish: vastukset (fi) pl, vaiva (fi)

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Help:How to check translations.

Translations to be checked

• Interlingua: travalio
• Spanish: esfuerzo m

Verb

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.

Synonyms

• swink

Translations

to labor, to work

• Arabic: تعب (ar) (táʿiba), كدح (ar) (kádaḥa)
• Czech: dřít (cs)
• Dutch: werken (nl),labeuren (nl),
• Finnish: raataa (fi), rehkiä (fi)

• French: travailler (fr)
• German: schuften (de), sich plagen (de), sich quälen (de)
• Russian: трудиться (ru) (trudít’sja)

See also

• toil and moil

Anagrams

• loti

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Basque

Noun

toil

1. conger eel

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Irish

Etymology

From Old Irish tol (“will, desire”).

Noun

toil f (genitive tola)

1. will

Declension

Declension of toil

Third declension

Bare forms (no plural for this noun): Case Singular Nominative toil Vocative a thoil Genitive tola Dative toil

Forms with the definite article: Case Singular Nominative an toil Genitive na tola Dative leis an toil don toil

Derived terms

• le do thoil
• más é do thoil é

Mutation

Irish mutation
Radical	Lenition	Eclipsis
toil	thoil	dtoil
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs.

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Scottish Gaelic

Etymology

From Old Irish tol (“will, desire”).

Pronunciation

• IPA: [t̪ɔl], /t̪ʰɔl/

Noun

toil f (genitive toile, plural toilean)

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

Phrases

• Is toil leum - I like
• Mas e do thoil e - please

Derived terms

• mì-thoil
• saor-thoil
• toileach