spill
Part of speech: verb
noun
Morphological type: simple
Topics: business
government
mining
nautical
politics
transport
Etymology: 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.
Inflected forms:
form: spills
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: spilling
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: spilled
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: spilled
pos: verb
tags: past
form: spilt
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: spilt
pos: verb
tags: past
form: spills
pos: noun
tags: plural
Senses:
gloss: To drop something so that it spreads out or makes a mess; to accidentally pour.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: I spilled some sticky juice on the kitchen floor.
gloss: To spread out or fall out, as above.
pos: verb
tags: intransitive
examples: Some sticky juice spilled onto the kitchen floor.
He was so topful of himself, that he let it spill on all the company.
gloss: To overflow out of a designated area.
pos: verb
tags: intransitive
examples: The crowd spilled onto Maple Avenue.
gloss: To drop something that was intended to be caught.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: That should have been that, but Hart caught a dose of the Hennessey wobbles and spilled Adlene Guedioura's long-range shot.
gloss: To mar; to damage; to destroy by misuse; to waste.
pos: verb
examples: They [the colours] disfigure the stuff and spill the whole workmanship.
Spill not the morning (the quintessence of day) in recreations.
gloss: To be destroyed, ruined, or wasted; to come to ruin; to perish; to waste.
pos: verb
tags: intransitive
obsolete
examples: That thou wilt suffer innocence to spill.
This winter’s weather it waxeth cold, / And frost it freezeth on every hill, / And Boreas blows his blast so bold / That all our cattle are like to spill.
gloss: To overflow or flow out, over or off something.
pos: verb
tags: also
figuratively
intransitive
examples: 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.
gloss: To cause or flow out and be lost or wasted; to shed.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: to revenge his Blood, ſo juſtly ſpilt, / VVhat is it leſs then to partake his guilt?
The cracking sound, he explained, as far as I, a non-plumber, could understand, was the sound of the overworked, undermaintained and weirdly installed heating unit’s core rupturing and spilling water into the basement.
gloss: To cause to be thrown from a mount, a carriage, etc.
pos: verb
tags: obsolete
slang
transitive
examples: Then, not thirty feet beyond, a sudden panicky lunge to the side by his horse spilled him from the saddle.
gloss: To cover or decorate with slender pieces of wood, metal, ivory, etc.; to inlay.
pos: verb
examples: And all the others pavement were with yvory spilt
gloss: 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.
pos: verb
gloss: To open the leadership of a parliamentary party for re-election.
pos: verb
tags: Australian
transitive
gloss: To reveal information to an uninformed party.
pos: verb
tags: ambitransitive
examples: He spilled his guts out to his new psychologist.
‘You wanted to know where we were going. Follow me. I’m going to spill it.’
gloss: To come undone.
pos: verb
gloss: To express (something), especially repeatedly or floridly; to be expressed.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: He spilled insults about the other team.
Praise spilled from him every day.
gloss: Any thing that has been spilled; the resulting mess.
pos: noun
gloss: A fall or stumble.
pos: noun
examples: The bruise is from a bad spill he had last week.
gloss: Synonym of taper, a thin stick, long wick, etc. used to transfer flame.
pos: noun
tags: archaic
examples: “In a moment, he has torn the letter into long thin strips, and rolling them up into spills he thrusts them hurriedly in amongst the other spills in the vase on the mantle-piece.”
Kit froze with the pipe between his teeth, the relit spill pressed to the weed within it.
gloss: A slender piece of anything.
pos: noun
gloss: A slender piece of anything.
pos: noun
gloss: A slender piece of anything.
pos: noun
examples: A tool with which to extract the spills from the pile.
gloss: A slender piece of anything.
pos: noun
tags: Shropshire
gloss: One of the thick laths or poles driven horizontally ahead of the main timbering in advancing a level in loose ground.
pos: noun
gloss: The situation where sound is picked up by a microphone from a source other than that which is intended.
pos: noun
gloss: A small sum of money.
pos: noun
tags: obsolete
examples: Spill or Sportule for the same from the credulous Laity
gloss: A declaration that the leadership of a parliamentary party is vacant, and open for re-election. Short form of leadership spill.
pos: noun
tags: Australian
Derived words: antispill
cry over spilt milk
forspill
nonspill
oil spill
prespill
spillable
spillage
spillback
spill blood
spiller
spill ink
spillionaire
spill juice
spill kit
spill one's guts
spill one's guts out
spill one's seed
spill out
spill over
spillover
spillproof
spill the beans
spill the tea
spill vase
spillway
spilly
spilth
spilt milk
take a spill
there's no point crying over spilt milk
there's no use crying over spilt milk
unspill
unspilled
Translations: