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spill

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
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English

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Etymology

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From Middle English spillen, from Old English spillan, spildan (“to kill, destroy, waste”), from Proto-West Germanic *spilþijan, from Proto-Germanic *spilþijaną (“to spoil, kill, murder”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)pel- (“to sunder, split, rend, tear”).

Cognate with Dutch spillen (“to use needlessly, waste”), French gaspiller ("to waste, squander" < Germanic), Bavarian spillen (“to split, cleave, splinter”), Danish spilde (“to spill, waste”), Swedish spilla (“to spill, waste”), Icelandic spilla (“to contaminate, spoil”). See also spool.

Pronunciation

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Verb

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spill (third-person singular simple present spills, present participle spilling, simple past and past participle spilled or spilt)

  1. (transitive) To drop something so that it spreads out or makes a mess; to accidentally pour.
    I spilled some sticky juice on the kitchen floor.
  2. (intransitive) To spread out or fall out, as above.
    Some sticky juice spilled onto the kitchen floor.
    • 1741, I[saac] Watts, The Improvement of the Mind: Or, A Supplement to the Art of Logick: […], London: […] James Brackstone, […], →OCLC:
      He was so topful of himself, that he let it spill on all the company.
  3. (intransitive, of a crowd or people within a crowd) To overflow out of a designated area.
    The crowd spilled onto Maple Avenue.
  4. (transitive) To drop something that was intended to be caught.
    • 2011 October 29, Neil Johnston, “Norwich 3 - 3 Blackburn”, in BBC Sport‎[1]:
      That should have been that, but Hart caught a dose of the Hennessey wobbles and spilled Adlene Guedioura's long-range shot.
  5. To mar; to damage; to destroy by misuse; to waste.
    • 1589, George Puttenham, The Arte of English Poesie:
      They [the colours] disfigure the stuff and spill the whole workmanship.
    • 1642, Thomas Fuller, The Holy State, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: […] Roger Daniel for John Williams, […], →OCLC:
      Spill not the morning (the quintessence of day) in recreations.
  6. (obsolete, intransitive) To be destroyed, ruined, or wasted; to come to ruin; to perish; to waste.
  7. (intransitive, also figurative) To overflow or flow out, over or off something.
    • 2025 February 5, Dr Joseph Brennan, “Railway Heritage saved in 2024”, in RAIL, number 1028, page 53:
      Liverpool Street's 1985-92 remodelling by the British Rail Architects' Department (under project lead Nick Derbyshire) had carefully followed original 1870s detailing, with the concourse designed to allow natural light to spill into the station.
  8. (transitive) To cause or flow out and be lost or wasted; to shed.
  9. (transitive, slang, obsolete) To cause to be thrown from a mount, a carriage, etc.
    • 2007, Eric Flint, David Weber, 1634: The Baltic War:
      Then, not thirty feet beyond, a sudden panicky lunge to the side by his horse spilled him from the saddle.
  10. To cover or decorate with slender pieces of wood, metal, ivory, etc.; to inlay.
  11. (nautical) To relieve a sail from the pressure of the wind, so that it can be more easily reefed or furled, or to lessen the strain.
  12. (transitive, Australian politics) To open the leadership of a parliamentary party for re-election.
  13. (ambitransitive) To reveal information to an uninformed party.
    He spilled his guts out to his new psychologist.
    • 1932, Delos W. Lovelace, King Kong, published 1965, page 32:
      ‘You wanted to know where we were going. Follow me. I’m going to spill it.’
  14. (of a knot) To come undone.
  15. (transitive) To express (something), especially repeatedly or floridly; to be expressed.
    He spilled insults about the other team.
    Praise spilled from him every day.

Derived terms

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Translations

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Noun

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spill (plural spills)

  1. (countable) A mess of something that has been dropped.
  2. A fall or stumble.
    The bruise is from a bad spill he had last week.
  3. A small stick or piece of paper used to light a candle, cigarette etc by the transfer of a flame from a fire.
    • 2008, Elizabeth Bear, Ink and Steel: A Novel of the Promethean Age:
      Kit froze with the pipe between his teeth, the relit spill pressed to the weed within it.
  4. A slender piece of anything.
    1. A peg or pin for plugging a hole, as in a cask; a spile.
    2. A metallic rod or pin.
    3. A spillikin.
      • 1971, Gwen White, Antique Toys And Their Background, page 125:
        A tool with which to extract the spills from the pile.
    4. (Shropshire, Herefordshire) A splinter caught in the skin.
  5. (mining) One of the thick laths or poles driven horizontally ahead of the main timbering in advancing a level in loose ground.
  6. (sound recording) The situation where sound is picked up by a microphone from a source other than that which is intended.
  7. (obsolete) A small sum of money.
    • 1726, John Ayliffe, Parergon Juris Canonici Anglicani: Or, A Commentary, by Way of Supplement to the Canons and Constitutions of the Church of England. […], London: […] D. Leach, and sold by John Walthoe […], →OCLC:
      Spill or Sportule for the same from the credulous Laity
  8. (Australian politics) A declaration that the leadership of a parliamentary party is vacant, and open for re-election. Short form of leadership spill.

Quotations

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Derived terms

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(Terms derived from the noun or verb spill):

Translations

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Anagrams

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Gothic

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Romanization

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spill

  1. Romanization of 𐍃𐍀𐌹𐌻𐌻

Indonesian

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Etymology

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From English spill.

Verb

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spill

  1. (slang) to spill a person's secret or disgrace

Luxembourgish

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Verb

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spill

  1. second-person singular imperative of spillen

Middle English

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Etymology

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From Old English spillan.

Verb

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spill

  1. Alternative form of spillen

Norwegian Bokmål

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Alternative forms

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Etymology 1

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From the verb spille.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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spill n (definite singular spillet, indefinite plural spill, definite plural spilla or spillene)

  1. a game (or part of a game, e.g., a hand, a round); equipment for a game (e.g., deck of cards, set of dice, board, men, pieces, etc.)
  2. play, playing
    ballen er ute av spill - the ball is out of play
  3. gambling; card-playing
  4. musical instrument (in compounds such as trekkspill (“accordion”))
  5. stage play
  6. flickering, play, sparkling (of flames, lights, colors, eyes, a smile)
Derived terms
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See also
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Etymology 2

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Verb

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spill

  1. imperative of spille

References

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Swedish

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Noun

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spill n

  1. waste, unusable surplus material
  2. a spill (a mess of something spilled, dropped or leaked)

Declension

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Declension of spill
nominative genitive
singular indefinite spill spills
definite spillet spillets
plural indefinite spill spills
definite spillen spillens

Verb

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spill

  1. imperative of spilla
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