till

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See also: Till

English

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Pronunciation

  • enPR: tĭl, IPA(key): /tɪl/
  • Audio (US)(file)
  • Rhymes: -ɪl

Etymology 1

From Middle English til, from Northern Old English til, from or akin to Old Norse til (“to, till”); both from Proto-Germanic *til (“to, toward”), from Proto-Germanic *tilą (“planned point in time”).[1][2] Not a shortening of until; rather, until comes from till with the prefix un- (“against; toward; up to”) also found in unto. Cognate with Old Frisian til (“to, till”), Danish til (“to”), Swedish till (“to, till”), Icelandic til (“to, till”). Also related to Old English til (“good”), German Ziel (“goal”), Gothic 𐍄𐌹𐌻 (til, “something fitting or suitable”).

Usage notes

"till" in this context is usually considered colloquial in modern English (except for in some regional varients such as Indian English) and in most cases can be replaced by "until" or "to".

Preposition

till

  1. Until; to, up to; as late as (a given time).
    She stayed till the very end.
    It's twenty till two. (1:40)
    I have to work till eight o'clock tonight.
    • 1854, Prof. John Wilson, The Genius and Character of Burns, p.194 (Google preview):
      Similar sentiments will recur to everyone familiar with his writings all through them till the very end.
    • 2019 March 14, Ramzy Baroud, “Chasing mirages: What are Palestinians doing to combat ‘Deal of the Century’?”, in Ma'an News‎[1]:
      While the PA has not always seen eye-to-eye with US foreign policy, its survival remained, till recently, a top American priority.
  2. (obsolete) To, up to (physically).
    They led him till his tent
    • 1599, William Shakespeare (attributed), The Passionate Pilgrim:
      She, poor bird, as all forlorn / Lean'd her breast up-till a thorn / And there sung the dolefull'st ditty, / To to hear it was great pity.
    • 1806, “Lord Wa'Yates and Auld Ingram”, in Robert Jameson, editor, Popular Ballads and Songs, volume 2:
      And till the kirk she wadna gae, / nor till't she wadna ride, / Till four-and-twenty men she gat her before, / And twenty on ilka side
    • 1838, “The Outlaw Murray”, in Walter Scott, editor, Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border:
      For a king to gang an outlaw till / Is beneath his state and his dignitie.
  3. (dialectal) To make it possible that.
    • 1953?, Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot
      VLADIMIR: Together again at last! We'll have to celebrate this. But how? (He reflects.) Get up till I embrace you.
Synonyms
Translations

Conjunction

till

  1. Until, until the time that.
    Maybe you can, maybe you can't: you won't know till you try.
    • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Song of Solomon 2:7:
      I charge you, O ye daughters of Ierusalem, by the Roes, and by the hindes of the field, that ye stirre not vp, nor awake my loue, till she please.
    • 1846, Edward Lear, The Book of Nonsense:
      She twirled round and round, / Till she sunk underground, […]
    • 1912, anonymous, Punky Dunk and the Mouse, P.F. Volland & Co.:
      And the Mouse sat and laughed till he cried.
Synonyms
Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English tylle (“till”), potentially from Middle English tillen (“to draw”) from Old English *tyllan (as in betyllan (“to lure, decoy”) and fortyllan (“to draw away”); related to tollian). Cognate with Albanian ndjell (“I lure, attract”).

Alternatively, Middle English tylle is from Anglo-Norman tylle (“compartment”) from Old French tille (“compartment, shelter on a ship”) from Old Norse þilja (“plank”).

Noun

till (plural tills)

  1. A cash register.
  2. A removable box within a cash register containing the money.
    Pull all the tills and lock them in the safe.
  3. The contents of a cash register, for example at the beginning or end of the day or of a cashier's shift.
    My count of my till was 30 dollars short.
  4. (obsolete) A tray or drawer in a chest.
Derived terms
Translations

Etymology 3

From Middle English tilyen, from Old English tilian.

Verb

till (third-person singular simple present tills, present participle tilling, simple past and past participle tilled)

  1. (transitive) To develop so as to improve or prepare for usage; to cultivate (said of knowledge, virtue, mind etc.).
  2. (transitive) To work or cultivate or plough (soil); to prepare for growing vegetation and crops.
  3. (intransitive) To cultivate soil.
  4. (obsolete) To prepare; to get.
    (Can we find and add a quotation of W. Browne to this entry?)
Quotations
Translations

Etymology 4

Unknown, but possibly via etymology 3 (the verb) because alluvial deposit is used as a fertilizer.

Noun

English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

till (plural tills)

  1. glacial drift consisting of a mixture of clay, sand, pebbles and boulders
  2. (dialect) manure or other material used to fertilize land
Derived terms
Translations

Etymology 5

From Middle English tylle; shortened from lentile (English lentil).

Noun

till (plural tills)

  1. A vetch; a tare.

References

General
Footnotes
  1. ^ Kroonen, Guus. 2013. Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic
  2. ^ Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “till”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.

Anagrams

Estonian

Noun

till (genitive tilli, partitive tilli)

  1. dill (herb)
  2. (slang) penis

Declension

This noun needs an inflection-table template.

Middle English

Verb

till

  1. Alternative form of tillen (“to enthrall”)

Scottish Gaelic

Pronunciation

Verb

till (past thill, future tillidh, verbal noun tilleadh, past participle tillte)

  1. to return, come back
  2. to relapse
    • Thill ris. ― He has got a relapse.

References

  • A Pronouncing and Etymological Dictionary of the Gaelic Language (John Grant, Edinburgh, 1925, Compiled by Malcolm MacLennan)

Swedish

Etymology

From Old Swedish til, from Old Norse til, from Proto-Germanic *tila- (“goal”), from Proto-Indo-European *ád (“near, at”).

Pronunciation

Preposition

till

  1. to
    Välkommen till Sverige!
    Welcome to Sweden!
    Ge den till mig.
    Give it to me.
    Vi behöver två till fem nya datorer.
    We need two to five new computers.
  2. for
    en bra TV till ett bra pris
    a good TV for a good price
    Vad vill du ha till middag?
    What do you want for dinner?
    en present till min syster
    a present for my sister
    pengar till resan
    money for the trip
  3. with
    Jag tar mjölk till mitt kaffe
    I take milk with my coffee

Usage notes

Derived terms

Adverb

till

  1. another; in addition
    • Jag ska vara här en vecka till.
      • I'll be here for another week.

Wolof

Noun

till (definite form till gi)

  1. jackal
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