poll
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /pɔl/
ipa: /pəʊl/
ipa: /pɒʊl/
ipa: /pɒl/
ipa: /poʊl/
ipa: /pol/
rhymes: -əʊl
homophone: pole
homophone: Pole
Forms: form: polls
form: polling
form: polled
form: polled
form: pol
form: pole
Etymology: From Middle English pol, polle ("scalp, pate"), from or cognate with Middle Dutch pol, pōle, polle (“top, summit; head”), from Proto-West Germanic *poll, from Proto-Germanic *pullaz (“round object, head, top”), from Proto-Indo-European *bolno-, *bōwl- (“orb, round object, bubble”), from Proto-Indo-European *bew- (“to blow, swell”).
Akin to Scots pow (“head, crown, scalp, skull”), Saterland Frisian pol (“round, full, brimming”, adjective), German Low German Polle, Poll (“round object, ball”), German Low German Poller (“head, tree-top, bulb”), Danish puld (“crown of a hat”), Swedish dialectal pull (“head”).
Meaning "collection of votes" is first recorded 1625, from the notion of "counting heads".
Senses: glosses: To take, record the votes of (an electorate).
glosses: To solicit mock votes from (a person or group).
examples: text: Mr. Millbank's friends were not disheartened, as it was known that the leading members of Mr. Rigby's Committee had polled; whereas his opponent's were principally reserved.
ref: 1844, B[enjamin] Disraeli, chapter IV, in Coningsby; or, The New Generation. […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, book V, page 271:
glosses: To vote at an election.
examples: text: He polled a hundred votes more than his opponent.
text: poll for points of faith his trusty vote
ref: 1717, Thomas Tickell, An Epistle from a Lady in England to a Gentleman at Avignon:
glosses: To register or deposit, as a vote; to elicit or call forth, as votes or voters.
examples: text: to poll the hair; to poll wool; to poll grass
text: Who, as he polled off his dart's head, so sure he had decreed
That all the counsels of their war he would poll off like it.
ref: [1611?], Homer, “(please specify |book=I to XXIV)”, in Geo[rge] Chapman, transl., The Iliads of Homer Prince of Poets. […], London: […] Nathaniell Butter, →OCLC; republished as The Iliads of Homer, Prince of Poets, […], new edition, volume (please specify the book number), London: Charles Knight and Co., […], 1843, →OCLC:
glosses: To cut off; to remove by clipping, shearing, etc.; to mow or crop.
examples: text: when he [Absalom] polled his head
ref: 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Bible Samuel/#14 2 Samuel:14–26:
text: 1579-1603, Thomas North, Plutarch's Lives
His death did so grieve them that they polled themselves; they clipped off their horse and mule's hairs.
glosses: To cut the hair of (a creature).
glosses: To remove the horns of (an animal).
examples: text: to poll a tree
glosses: To remove the top or end of; to clip; to lop.
examples: text: The network hub polled the department’s computers to determine which ones could still respond.
topics: communication
communications
computing
engineering
mathematics
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
sciences
glosses: To (repeatedly) request the status of something (such as a computer or printer on a network).
examples: text: The election was a resounding defeat for Robert McCartney who polled badly in the six constituencies he contested and even lost his own Assembly seat in North Down.
ref: 2008, Joanne McEvoy, The politics of Northern Ireland, page 171:
glosses: To be judged in a poll.
raw_tags: with adverb
examples: text: they slew Julius Caesar, who neither pilled nor polled the country but only was a favorer and suborner of all them that did rob and spoil, by his countenance and authority.
ref: 1579, Thomas North, Plutarch's Parallel Lives, Life of Brutus, paragraph 35:
text: Which pols and pils the poore in piteous wize
ref: 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book V, Canto II”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 6:
glosses: To extort from; to plunder; to strip. Especially in conjunction with pill for emphasis.
glosses: To impose a tax upon.
examples: text: the man that polled but twelve pence for his head
ref: 1693, Decimus Junius Juvenalis, John Dryden, transl., “[The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis.] The Third Satyr”, in The Satires of Decimus Junius Juvenalis. Translated into English Verse. […] Together with the Satires of Aulus Persius Flaccus. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson […], →OCLC:
glosses: To pay as one's personal tax.
examples: text: polling the reformed churches whether they equalize in number those of his three kingdoms
ref: 1649, J[ohn] Milton, ΕΙΚΟΝΟΚΛΆΣΤΗΣ [Eikonoklástēs] […], London: […] Matthew Simmons, […], →OCLC:
glosses: To enter, as polls or persons, in a list or register; to enroll, especially for purposes of taxation; to enumerate one by one.
examples: text: a polled deed
topics: law
glosses: To cut or shave smooth or even; to cut in a straight line without indentation
Derived terms: overpoll
pollable
poller
repoll