gambol

English

Etymology

From earlier gambolde, from Middle French gambade (modern gambade).

Pronunciation

• (UK, US) IPA^(key): /ˈɡæm.bəl/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -æmbəl
• Homophone: gamble

• Audio (UK)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -əʊl

Verb

gambol (third-person singular simple present gambols, present participle (UK) gambolling or (US) gamboling, simple past and past participle (UK) gambolled or (US) gamboled)

1. (intransitive) To move about playfully; to frolic.
   • 1835: William Gilmore Simms, The Partisan: A Romance of the Revolution, chapter XI, page 134 (Harper)

     The lawn spread freely onward, as of old, over which, in sweet company, he had once gambolled.

   • 1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, Canto XXX, page 48:

     At our old pastimes in the hall
     ⁠We gambol’d, making vain pretence
     ⁠Of gladness, with an awful sense
     Of one mute Shadow watching all.

   • 1907, Paul Lafargue, The rights of the horse, page 160:

     […] she remains near him to suckle him and teach him to choose the delicious grasses of the meadow, in which he gambols until he is grown.

   • 1943 November – 1944 February (date written; published 1945 August 17), George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], Animal Farm […], London: Secker & Warburg, published May 1962, →OCLC:

     In the ecstasy of that thought they gambolled round and round, they hurled themselves into great leaps of excitement.

   • 1948, F. H. Lyon, chapter 5, in Kon-Tiki, translation of original by Thor Heyerdahl, →ISBN, page 143:

     [The whales] quite enjoyed themselves gamboling freely among the waves in the sunshine.

   • 1995, Neal Stephenson, The Diamond Age […] , New York: Bantam Spectra, →ISBN, page 259:

     Three girls moved across the billiard-table lawn of a great manor house, circling and swarming about a common center of gravity like gamboling sparrows.

   • 2012, ミラクルミュージカル (lyrics and music), “Murders”, in Hawaii: Part II:

     They were in the white wood / Gamboling out to picnic

2. (British, West Midlands) To do a forward roll.

Translations

to move about playfully

• Bulgarian: подскачам от радост (podskačam ot radost)
• Finnish: kirmata, kirmailla (fi)
• French: gambader (fr)
• Georgian: ხტუნავს (xṭunavs), ცელქობს (celkobs), ნავარდობს (navardobs), ციგლიგებს (cigligebs)
• German: herumtollen (de), herumhüpfen, herumspringen (de)
• Maori: tuapa, tākarokaro

to do a forward roll

• Finnish: tehdä kuperkeikka
• Hungarian: bukfencezik (hu)

Noun

gambol (plural gambols)

1. An instance of running or skipping about playfully.
   • c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i], page 278, column 1:

     Heere hung those lipps, that I haue kist I know not how oft. VVhere be your Iibes now? Your Gambals? Your Songs? Your flashes of Merriment that were wont to set the Table on a Rore?

   • 1843, Edgar Allan Poe, The Gold Bug, page 10:

     When his gambols were over, I looked at the paper, and, to speak the truth, found myself not a little puzzled at what my friend had depicted.

2. An instance of more general frisking or frolicking.
   • 1819 June 23, Geoffrey Crayon [pseudonym; Washington Irving], “The Voyage”, in The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., number I, New York, N.Y.: […] C. S. Van Winkle, […], →OCLC, page 14:

     There was a delicious sensation of mingled security and awe with which I looked down, from my giddy height, on the monsters of the deep at their uncouth gambols.

   • 1874 October, “Salad Days”, in The American Educational Monthly, page 462:

     The season of salad days has been rightly called a season of folly—rightly, because nature wisely intended salad days for folly, and we are wise to regard them as a time for folly. But are we wise when, halting upon the crutches age finds convenient after the gambols of youth have lost their attractions, we condemn this season of harmless folly to perpetual reprobation?

Translations

instance

• Bulgarian: подскок m (podskok)
• Finnish: kirmailu
• French: gambade (fr) f
• Georgian: ხტუნაობა (xṭunaoba), ცელქობა (celkoba), ციგლიგი (cigligi), ნავარდი (navardi)
• German: Tollerei f
• Maori: tuapa

Tagalog

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɡamˈbol/, [ɡɐmˈbol]
• Hyphenation: gam‧bol

Adjective

gamból (Baybayin spelling ᜄᜋ᜔ᜊᜓᜎ᜔)

1. badly beaten up (as of the body)

   Synonym: bugbog

2. badly bruised (as of fruits, etc.)

   Synonym: lamog

Derived terms

• gambulin
• gumambol

 

Noun

gamból (Baybayin spelling ᜄᜋ᜔ᜊᜓᜎ᜔)

1. continuous beating (of someone)

   Synonyms: pagbugbog, paglamog

2. condition of being badly bruised (as of fruits, a person, etc.)