kyle

See also: Kyle and kýle

English

WOTD – 30 November 2021

Etymology

The Kyles of Bute, a series of narrow sea channels between the Isle of Bute and the Cowal peninsula, seen from Tighnabruaich in Argyll and Bute, Scotland, United Kingdom.

From Scottish Gaelic caol (“narrow; thin; firth, narrows, strait, kyle; narrow part of something”) (genitive singular form caoil), from Old Irish cáel (“narrow, slender, thin; delicate, fine”), from Proto-Celtic *koilos (“thin”), from Proto-Indo-European *skey- (“to dissect; to split”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /kaɪl/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Homophones: chyle, kile, Kyle
• Rhymes: -aɪl

Noun

kyle (plural kyles)

1. (Scotland) A narrow arm or channel of the sea between an island and the mainland, or between two islands.

   Synonyms: firth, narrow, sound, strait

   • 1877 January, [John Campbell] Shairp, “The Clearing of the Glens”, in Alexander Mackenzie, editor, The Celtic Magazine: A Monthly Periodical Devoted to the Literature, History, Antiquities, Folk Lore, Traditions, and the Social and Material Interests of the Celt at Home and Abroad, volume II, number XV, Inverness, Inverness-shire: A. & W. Mackenzie, […], →OCLC, canto IV (The Home by Lochburn), stanza IV, page 104:

     [T]hough remote / From the main ocean many a mile / Inflooded past cape, creek, and kyle, / The sea-loch flanked by precipice walls, / With ever-lessening murmur crawls, / Till 'neath the Pass he lies subdued / By the o'er-aweing solitude; […]

Derived terms

• Kyle of Lochalsh
• Kyle of Sutherland
• Kyle of Tongue

Translations

narrow arm or channel of the sea

• Irish: caol m
• Scottish Gaelic: caol m, caolas m

Further reading

• strait on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• kyle (disambiguation) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• “kyle”, in The Dictionary of the Scots Language, Edinburgh: Scottish Language Dictionaries, 2004–present, →OCLC.

Anagrams

• Lyke, lyke, yelk

Nisenan

Noun

kyle

1. woman

References

• Andrew Eatough, Central Hill Nisenan Texts with Grammatical Sketch

Scots

Noun

kyle (plural kyles)

1. a ninepin; a skittle