bill

English Online Dictionary. What means bill‎? What does bill mean?

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /bɪl/, enPR: bîl
  • (Received Pronunciation, US) IPA^(key): [bɪɫ]
  • (l-vocalizing: UK, General Australian, New Zealand) IPA^(key): [bɪo̯], [bɪʊ̯]

• Rhymes: -ɪl

Etymology 1

From Middle English bille, from Anglo-Norman bille, from Old French bulle, from Medieval Latin bulla (“seal", "sealed document”). Compare bull.

Noun

bill (plural bills)

1. A written list or inventory. (Now obsolete except in specific senses or set phrases; bill of lading, bill of goods, etc.)
2. A document, originally sealed; a formal statement or official memorandum. (Now obsolete except with certain qualifying words; bill of health, bill of sale etc.)
4. A draft of a law, presented to a legislature for enactment; a proposed or projected law.

   Synonym: measure
5. (obsolete, law) A declaration made in writing, stating some wrong the complainant has suffered from the defendant, or a fault committed by some person against a law.
7. (US, Canada) A piece of paper money; a banknote.
   1. (slang, Canada, US) One hundred dollars.
8. (slang, UK) One hundred pounds sterling.
   • 2023, BBC News: "Newport: Drugs gang jailed for exploiting vulnerable child" [3]

     In the conversation Henshall says he ^[sic] "struggling to find people to go up the roads" explaining how it would be "no good for black people" and how they need a "young white boy to go up there".
     Stock agrees, saying how he knows "this kid" who "owes me 12 bills".

9. A written note of goods sold, services rendered, or work done, with the price or charge; an invoice.

   Synonyms: account, invoice
11. A paper, written or printed, and posted up or given away, to advertise something, as a lecture, a play, or the sale of goods

    Synonyms: broadsheet, broadside, card, circular, flier, flyer, handbill, poster, posting, placard, notice, throwaway
12. A writing binding the signer or signers to pay a certain sum at a future day or on demand, with or without interest, as may be stated in the document; a bill of exchange. In the United States, it is usually called a note, a note of hand, or a promissory note.

    Synonyms: bank bill, banker's bill, bank note, banknote, Federal Reserve note, government note, greenback, note
13. A set of items presented together.
14. (Eton College) A list of pupils to be disciplined for breaking school rules.
    • 1875, Sir H. C. Maxwell Lyte, A History of Eton College, 1440-1875 (page 373)

      One of the best stories of the period describes the misadventure of a batch of candidates for confirmation whose names were by accident sent up to the Head-Master on a piece of paper identical in size and shape with the "bill" used by the Masters for the purpose of reporting delinquents. Keate, we are told, insisted on flogging all the boys mentioned in the document […]

Derived terms

Descendants

• → Swahili: bili
• → Thai: บิล (bin)
• → Tokelauan: pili
• → Jamaican Creole: bills

Translations

See also

• check

Verb

bill (third-person singular simple present bills, present participle billing, simple past and past participle billed)

1. (transitive) To advertise by a bill or public notice.

   Synonym: placard
2. (transitive) To charge; to send a bill to.

   Synonym: charge

Derived terms

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English bill, bil, bille, bile, from Old English bile (“beak (of a bird); trunk (of an elephant)”), of unknown origin. Perhaps from a special use of Old English bil, bill (“hook; sword”) (see below).

Noun

bill (plural bills)

2. The beak of a bird, especially when small or flattish; sometimes also used with reference to a platypus, turtle, or other animal.

   Synonyms: beak, neb, nib, pecker
3. A beak-like projection, especially a promontory.

4. Of a cap or hat: the brim or peak, serving as a shade to keep sun off the face and out of the eyes.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

bill (third-person singular simple present bills, present participle billing, simple past and past participle billed)

1. (obsolete) to peck
2. to stroke bill against bill, with reference to doves; to caress in fondness

Derived terms

• bill and coo

Translations

Etymology 3

From Middle English bill, bille, bil, from Old English bil, bill (“a hooked point; curved weapon; two-edged sword”), from Proto-Germanic *bilją (“axe; sword; blade”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeyH- (“to strike; beat”). Cognate with West Frisian bile (“axe”), Dutch bijl (“axe”), German Bille (“axe”).

Noun

bill (plural bills)

2. Any of various bladed or pointed hand weapons, originally designating an Anglo-Saxon sword, and later a weapon of infantry, especially in the 14th and 15th centuries, commonly consisting of a broad, heavy, double-edged, hook-shaped blade, with a short pike at the back and another at the top, attached to the end of a long staff.

   Synonym: polearm
4. A cutting instrument, with hook-shaped point, and fitted with a handle, used in pruning, etc.; a billhook.

   Synonyms: billhook, hand bill, hedgebill

6. Somebody armed with a bill; a billman.

   Synonym: billman

8. A pickaxe or mattock.
10. (nautical) The extremity of the arm of an anchor; the point of or beyond the fluke (also called the peak).

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

bill (third-person singular simple present bills, present participle billing, simple past and past participle billed)

1. (transitive) To dig, chop, etc., with a bill.

Translations

Etymology 4

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Noun

bill (plural bills)

1. The bell, or boom, of the bittern.

Etymology 5

From a pronunciation spelling of build.

Verb

bill (third-person singular simple present bills, present participle billing, simple past and past participle billed)

1. (transitive, intransitive, UK, slang) To roll up a marijuana cigarette.

Derived terms

Cimbrian

Etymology 1

From Middle High German wille, from Old High German willo, from Proto-Germanic *wiljô (“will, wish, desire”). Cognate with German Wille, English will.

Noun

bill m

1. (Sette Comuni) will (legal document)

   Synonym: testamentén

Etymology 2

From Middle High German wilde, from Old High German wildi, from Proto-West Germanic *wilþī, from Proto-Germanic *wilþijaz (“wild”). Cognate with German wild, English wild.

Adjective

bill (comparative billor, superlative dar billorste) (Sette Comuni)

1. wild, crazy, mad
2. wild (not domesticated)
3. stupid

Declension

Derived terms

• billa gòas
• billa hénna
• billar haano
• billar balt
• billekhot
• dorbìllaran

References

• “bill” in Martalar, Umberto Martello, Bellotto, Alfonso (1974) Dizionario della lingua Cimbra dei Sette Communi vicentini, 1st edition, Roana, Italy: Instituto di Cultura Cimbra A. Dal Pozzo

East Central German

Etymology

Compare German bisschen.

Adverb

bill

1. (Erzgebirgisch) (often with e or a) (a) little

Further reading

French

Etymology

Borrowed from English bill; doublet of bulle (“bubble”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /bil/

Noun

bill m (plural bills)

1. (law) bill (draft UK law)
2. (North America) bill (invoice in a restaurant etc)

Further reading

• “bill”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

Old English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /bill/, [biɫ]

Noun

bill n

1. Alternative form of bil

Swedish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /bɪl/
• Rhymes: -ɪl

Etymology 1

From Old Swedish bilder, from Old Norse bíldr, from Proto-Germanic *bīþlaz (“axe”). An instrumental derivation of *bītaną (“to bite”). Closely related to bila (“broadaxe”).

Noun

bill c

1. (agriculture) a share; the cutting blade of a plough

Declension

Derived terms

• plogbill

Etymology 2

Borrowed from English bill, from Middle English bille, from Anglo-Norman bille, from Old French bulle, from Medieval Latin bulla (“seal, sealed document”). Doublet of bulla.

Noun

bill c

1. (law) a draft of a law in English-speaking countries

Declension

References

• bill in Svenska Akademiens ordbok (SAOB)