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Wiktionary

gall

See also: gäll and Gall

English

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Pronunciation

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Etymology 1

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From Middle English galle, from Old English ġealla, galla,[1] from Proto-West Germanic *gallā, from Proto-Germanic *gallǭ.

The figurative senses (e.g., impudence, brazenness, chutzpah) are related to the literal sense (i.e., bile) via the lasting linguocultural effects of humorism, which governed Western medicine for many centuries before the advent of scientific medicine.

Related to Dutch gal, German Galle, Swedish galle, galla, Ancient Greek χολή (kholḗ). Also remotely related with yellow.[1]

Noun

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gall (countable and uncountable, plural galls)

  2. (uncountable) Impudence or brazenness; temerity, chutzpah.
    • 1917, Edgar Rice Burroughs, chapter 6, in The Oakdale Affair‎[1]:
      “Durn ye!” he cried. “I’ll lam ye! Get offen here. I knows ye. Yer one o’ that gang o’ bums that come here last night, an’ now you got the gall to come back beggin’ for food, eh? I’ll lam ye!” and he raised the gun to his shoulder.
    • 1891, Exercises of class day of the senior class, Tuesday, June 23, 1891, page 33:
      Prichard, while keeping school, had the unmitigated gall to teach Greek, although he had never studied the subject.
    • 1944, Teheran: Our Path in War and Peace, page 55:
      In July 1938, that was sufficient to call down contempt and hatred on us, and brand us as men of unmitigated gall.
    • 1962, How to live with a calculating cat, page 47:
      It requires the cunning of a chess master, the planning of a field marshal, the adroitness and polish of a premier of France, or, failing these, the sheer, unmitigated gall of your door-to-door salesman.
  3. (anatomy, dated, countable) A gallbladder.
  4. (physiology, archaic, uncountable) Bile, especially that of an animal; the greenish, profoundly bitter-tasting fluid found in bile ducts and gall bladders, structures associated with the liver.
  5. (figurative, uncountable) Great misery or physical suffering, likened to the bitterest-tasting of substances.
Derived terms
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Translations
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Etymology 2

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From Middle English galle, from Old English gealla (“a fretted spot on the skin”), from Proto-West Germanic *gallō, from Proto-Germanic *gallô (“infirmity, swelling, lesion”).

Noun

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gall (countable and uncountable, plural galls)

  1. (countable) A sore on a horse caused by an ill-fitted or ill-adjusted saddle; a saddle sore.
  2. (pathology, countable) A sore or open wound caused by chafing, which may become infected, as with a blister.
  3. (figurative, uncountable) A feeling of exasperation.
  4. (countable, technical) A pit on a surface being cut caused by the friction between the two surfaces exceeding the bond of the material at a point.
Derived terms
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Translations
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Verb

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gall (third-person singular simple present galls, present participle galling, simple past and past participle galled)

  1. (ergative) To chafe, to rub or subject to friction; to create a sore on the skin.
    • 1719 May 6 (Gregorian calendar), [Daniel Defoe], The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, […], London: […] W[illiam] Taylor […], →OCLC:
      […] he went awkwardly in these clothes at first: wearing the drawers was very awkward to him, and the sleeves of the waistcoat galled his shoulders and the inside of his arms; but a little easing them where he complained they hurt him, and using himself to them, he took to them at length very well.
  2. (transitive, figurative) To bother or trouble.
    • 1881–1882, Robert Louis Stevenson, “‘Pieces of Eight’”, in Treasure Island, London; Paris: Cassell & Company, published 14 November 1883, →OCLC, part V (My Sea Adventure), page 219:
      I went below, and did what I could for my wound; it pained me a good deal, and still bled freely; but it was neither deep nor dangerous, nor did it greatly gall me when I used my arm.
    • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XV, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
      Edward Churchill still attended to his work in a hopeless mechanical manner like a sleep-walker who walks safely on a well-known round. But his Roman collar galled him, his cossack stifled him, his biretta was as uncomfortable as a merry-andrew's cap and bells.
  3. (transitive, figurative) To harass, to harry, often with the intent to cause injury.
    • June 24, 1778, George Washington, The Writings of George Washington From the Original Manuscript Sources: Volume 12, 1745–1799
      The disposition for these detachments is as follows – Morgans corps, to gain the enemy’s right flank; Maxwells brigade to hang on their left. Brigadier Genl. Scott is now marching with a very respectable detachment destined to gall the enemys left flank and rear.
  4. (transitive, figurative) To exasperate.
    • 1979 December, Mark Bowden, “Captivity Pageant”, in The Atlantic, volume 296, number 5, pages 92–97:
      Metrinko was hungry, but he was galled by how self-congratulatory his captors seemed, how generous and noble and proudly Islamic.
  5. (transitive, technical) To cause pitting on a surface being cut from the friction between the two surfaces exceeding the bond of the material at a point.
    Improper cooling and a dull milling cutter on titanium can gall the surface.
  6. (intransitive, obsolete, rare) To scoff; to jeer.
    • 1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life of Henry the Fift”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i]:
      I have seen you gleeking and galling at this gentleman twice or thrice. You thought, because he could not speak English in the native garb, he could not therefore handle an English cudgel
Translations
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Etymology 3

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From Middle English galle, from Old French galle, from Latin galla (“oak-apple”).[2][3]

 
Galls on a dried leaf.

Noun

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gall (plural galls)

  1. (phytopathology) A blister or tumor-like growth found on the surface of plants, caused by various pathogens, especially the burrowing of insect larvae into the living tissues, such as that of the common oak gall wasp (Cynips quercusfolii).
    • 1974, Philip P. Wiener, editor, Dictionary of the History of Ideas‎[2]:
      Even so, Redi retained a belief that in certain other cases—the origin of parasites inside the human or animal body or of grubs inside of oak galls—there must be spontaneous generation. Bit by bit the evidence grew against such views. In 1670 Jan Swammerdam, painstaking student of the insect’s life cycle, suggested that the grubs in galls were enclosed in them for the sake of nourishment and must come from insects that had inserted their semen or their eggs into the plants.
  2. A bump-like imperfection resembling a gall.
    • 1653, Izaak Walton, chapter 21, in The Compleat Angler‎[3]:
      But first for your Line. First note, that you are to take care that your hair be round and clear, and free from galls, or scabs, or frets: for a well- chosen, even, clear, round hair, of a kind of glass-colour, will prove as strong as three uneven scabby hairs that are ill-chosen, and full of galls or unevenness. You shall seldom find a black hair but it is round, but many white are flat and uneven; therefore, if you get a lock of right, round, clear, glass-colour hair, make much of it.
Synonyms
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Derived terms
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Translations
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Verb

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gall (third-person singular simple present galls, present participle galling, simple past and past participle galled)

  1. (transitive) To impregnate with a decoction of gallnuts in dyeing.
    • 1815, Thomas Cooper, A Practical Treatise on Dyeing, and Callicoe Printing:
      Raw silk is not galled, it is dyed at once in the black without any preparation : the liquor should be hot

See also

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References

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  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 “gall, n.1”, in OED Online  ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.
  2. ^ “gall”, in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th edition, Boston, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016, →ISBN.
  3. ^ “galle, n.(3)”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.

Catalan

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Etymology

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Inherited from Latin gallus. Compare Occitan gal, Old French jal, Spanish gallo.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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gall m (plural galls)

  1. rooster, cock
  2. John Dory
    Synonym: gall marí

Derived terms

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See also

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References

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Hungarian

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Pronunciation

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Adjective

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gall (not comparable)

  1. Gallic (of or pertaining to Gaul, its people or language)

Declension

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Inflection (stem in -o-, back harmony)
singular plural
nominative gall gallok
accusative gallt gallokat
dative gallnak galloknak
instrumental gallal gallokkal
causal-final gallért gallokért
translative gallá gallokká
terminative gallig gallokig
essive-formal gallként gallokként
essive-modal gallul —
inessive gallban gallokban
superessive gallon gallokon
adessive gallnál galloknál
illative gallba gallokba
sublative gallra gallokra
allative gallhoz gallokhoz
elative gallból gallokból
delative gallról gallokról
ablative galltól galloktól
non-attributive
possessive - singular 		gallé galloké
non-attributive
possessive - plural 		galléi gallokéi

Noun

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gall (countable and uncountable, plural gallok)

  1. Gaul (person)
  2. Gaul (language)

Declension

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Inflection (stem in -o-, back harmony)
singular plural
nominative gall gallok
accusative gallt gallokat
dative gallnak galloknak
instrumental gallal gallokkal
causal-final gallért gallokért
translative gallá gallokká
terminative gallig gallokig
essive-formal gallként gallokként
essive-modal — —
inessive gallban gallokban
superessive gallon gallokon
adessive gallnál galloknál
illative gallba gallokba
sublative gallra gallokra
allative gallhoz gallokhoz
elative gallból gallokból
delative gallról gallokról
ablative galltól galloktól
non-attributive
possessive - singular 		gallé galloké
non-attributive
possessive - plural 		galléi gallokéi
Possessive forms of gall
possessor single possession multiple possessions
1st person sing. gallom galljaim
2nd person sing. gallod galljaid
3rd person sing. gallja galljai
1st person plural gallunk galljaink
2nd person plural gallotok galljaitok
3rd person plural galljuk galljaik
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Further reading

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  • gall in Bárczi, Géza and László Országh. A magyar nyelv értelmező szótára (“The Explanatory Dictionary of the Hungarian Language”, abbr.: ÉrtSz.). Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1959–1962. Fifth ed., 1992: →ISBN
  • gall in Nóra Ittzés, editor, A magyar nyelv nagyszótára [A Comprehensive Dictionary of the Hungarian Language] (Nszt.), Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 2006–2031 (work in progress; published a–ez as of 2024).

Icelandic

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Verb

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gall (strong)

  1. first-person singular past indicative of gjalla
  2. third-person singular past indicative of gjalla

Irish

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Pronunciation

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Etymology 1

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From Middle Irish gall (“foreigner”), from Latin Gallus (“a Gaul”). Cognate with Scottish Gaelic gall and Manx goal.

Noun

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gall m (genitive singular gaill, nominative plural gaill)

  1. foreigner
  2. (derogatory) Anglified Irish person
Derived terms
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Etymology 2

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Noun

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gall m (genitive singular gaill, nominative plural gaill)

  1. Alternative form of gallán

Declension

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Declension of gall (first declension)
bare forms
case singular plural
nominative gall gaill
vocative a ghaill a ghalla
genitive gaill gall
dative gall gaill
forms with the definite article
case singular plural
nominative an gall na gaill
genitive an ghaill na ngall
dative leis an ngall
don ghall 		leis na gaill

Mutation

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Mutated forms of gall
radical lenition eclipsis
gall ghall ngall

Note: Certain mutated forms of some words can never occur in standard Modern Irish.
All possible mutated forms are displayed for convenience.

References

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  1. ^ Finck, F. N. (1899) Die araner mundart (in German), volume II, Marburg: Elwert’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, page 120
  2. ^ Quiggin, E. C. (1906) A Dialect of Donegal, Cambridge University Press, § 206, page 79

Further reading

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Middle Irish

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Etymology

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From Latin Gallus (“a Gaul”).

Pronunciation

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Noun

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gall m (genitive gaill, nominative plural gaill)

  1. foreigner

Descendants

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  • Irish: gall
  • Manx: goal
  • Scottish Gaelic: gall

Mutation

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Mutation of gall
radical lenition nasalization
gall gall
pronounced with /ɣ(ʲ)-/		 ngall

Note: Certain mutated forms of some words can never occur in standard Middle Irish.
All possible mutated forms are displayed for convenience.

Further reading

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Scottish Gaelic

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Noun

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gall m (genitive singular goill, plural goill)

  1. Alternative letter-case form of Gall

Uzbek

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Noun

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gall (plural galllar)

  1. Gaul (person)

Derived terms

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Adjective

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gall (comparative gallroq, superlative eng gall)

  1. Gaulish
    gall tili
    the Gaulish language

Welsh

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Alternative forms

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  • geill (literary, third-person singular present/future)

Pronunciation

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Verb

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gall

  1. inflection of gallu:
    1. third-person singular present/future
    2. (literary, rare) second-person singular imperative

Mutation

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Mutated forms of gall
radical soft nasal aspirate
gall all ngall unchanged

Note: Certain mutated forms of some words can never occur in standard Welsh.
All possible mutated forms are displayed for convenience.

References

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  1. ^ Morris Jones, John (1913) A Welsh Grammar, Historical and Comparative, Oxford: Clarendon Press, § 51 v
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