furl

English

Etymology

Perhaps from Old French ferlier, modern French ferler.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /fɜːl/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /fɝl/

  • Audio (US):

    (file)

• Rhymes: -ɜː(ɹ)l

Verb

furl (third-person singular simple present furls, present participle furling, simple past and past participle furled)

1. (transitive) To lower, roll up and secure (something, such as a sail or flag)
   • 1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 14, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC, page 71:

     With the landless gull, that at sunset folds her wings and is rocked to sleep between billows; so at nightfall, the Nantucketer, out of sight of land, furls his sails, and lays him to his rest, while under his very pillow rush herds of walruses and whales.

   • 1866, Charles Dickens, The Signal-Man‎^[1]:

     When he heard a voice thus calling to him, he was standing at the door of his box, with a flag in his hand, furled round its short pole.

   • 1886, Peter Christen Asbjørnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 191:

     "'Oh yes, that's all very well, but we haven't done with it yet,' said the lad, 'we shall have it worse directly,' and he ordered them to furl every rag but the mizen."

Antonyms

• unfurl

Translations

to lower, roll up and secure something

• Bulgarian: свивам (bg) (svivam), сгъвам (bg) (sgǎvam), прибирам (bg) (pribiram)
• Dutch: gekruld (nl)
• Finnish: laskea (fi)
• French: ferler (fr)
• Galician: aferrar (gl)
• German: aufrollen (de), bergen (de), einrollen (de)
• Italian: ammainare (it), chiudere (it)
• Maori: rīwhi
• Norman: patchi, sèrrer
• Russian: свёртывать (ru) (svjórtyvatʹ)
• Spanish: aferrar (es), recoger (es)