Adjacent Words

Pill definitions

	Tweet

Webster's 1828 Dictionary

PILL, n. [L. pila, a ball; pilula, a little ball.]
1. In pharmacy, a medicine in the form of a little ball or small round mass, to be swallowed whole.
2. Any thing nauseous.
PILL, v.t. To rob; to plunder; to pillage, that is, to peel, to strip. [See Peel, the same word in the proper English orthography.]
PILL, v.i. To be peeled; to come off in flakes.
1. To rob. [See Peel.]

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

n
1: something that resembles a tablet of medicine in shape or size
2: a dose of medicine in the form of a small pellet [syn: pill, lozenge, tablet, tab]
3: a unpleasant or tiresome person
4: something unpleasant or offensive that must be tolerated or endured; "his competitor's success was a bitter pill to take"
5: a contraceptive in the form of a pill containing estrogen and progestin to inhibit ovulation and so prevent conception [syn: pill, birth control pill, contraceptive pill, oral contraceptive pill, oral contraceptive, anovulatory drug, anovulant]

Merriam Webster's

I. verb Etymology: Middle English pilen, pillen, partly from Old English pilian to peel, partly from Anglo-French piler to rob Date: 12th century intransitive verb dialect chiefly England to come off in flakes or scales ; peel transitive verb 1. archaic to subject to depredation or extortion 2. dialect to peel or strip off II. noun Etymology: Middle English pylle, from Anglo-French pile & Middle Dutch pille, both ultimately from Latin pilula, from diminutive of pila ball Date: 14th century 1. a. a usually medicinal or dietary preparation in a small rounded mass to be swallowed whole b. often capitalized birth control pill — usually used with the 2. something repugnant or unpleasant that must be accepted or endured 3. something resembling a pill in size or shape 4. a disagreeable or tiresome person III. verb Date: 1736 transitive verb 1. to dose with pills 2. blackball intransitive verb to become rough with or mat into little balls <brushed woolens often pill>

Oxford Reference Dictionary

n. 1 a solid medicine formed into a ball or a flat disc for swallowing whole. b (usu. prec. by the) colloq. a contraceptive pill. 2 an unpleasant or painful necessity; a humiliation (a bitter pill; must swallow the pill). 3 colloq. or joc. a ball, e.g. a football, a cannon-ball. Phrases and idioms: sugar (or sweeten) the pill make an unpleasant necessity acceptable. Etymology: MDu., MLG pille prob. f. L pilula dimin. of pila ball

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Pill Pill, n. [Cf. Peel skin, or Pillion.] The peel or skin. [Obs.] ``Some be covered over with crusts, or hard pills, as the locusts.'' --Holland.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Pill Pill, v. i. To be peeled; to peel off in flakes.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Pill Pill, v. t. [Cf. L. pilare to deprive of hair, and E. pill, n. (above).] 1. To deprive of hair; to make bald. [Obs.] 2. To peel; to make by removing the skin. [Jacob] pilled white streaks . . . in the rods. --Gen. xxx. 37.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Pill Pill, v. t. & i. [imp. & p. p. Pilled; p. pr. & vb. n. Pilling.] [F. piller, L. pilare; cf. It. pigliare to take. Cf. Peel to plunder.] To rob; to plunder; to pillage; to peel. See Peel, to plunder. [Obs.] --Spenser. Pillers and robbers were come in to the field to pill and to rob. --Sir T. Malroy.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Pill Pill, n. [F. pilute, L. pilula a pill, little ball, dim. of L. pila a ball. Cf. Piles.] 1. A medicine in the form of a little ball, or small round mass, to be swallowed whole. 2. Figuratively, something offensive or nauseous which must be accepted or endured.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(pills) Frequency: The word is one of the 3000 most common words in English. 1. Pills are small solid round masses of medicine or vitamins that you swallow without chewing. Why do I have to take all these pills? ...sleeping pills. = tablet N-COUNT 2. If a woman is on the pill, she takes a special pill that prevents her from becoming pregnant. She had been on the pill for three years. N-SING: the N 3. If a person or group has to accept a failure or an unpleasant piece of news, you can say that it was a bitter pill or a bitter pill to swallow. You're too old to be given a job. That's a bitter pill to swallow. PHRASE: N inflects 4. If someone does something to sweeten the pill or sugar the pill, they do it to make some unpleasant news or an unpleasant measure more acceptable. He sweetened the pill by increasing wages, although by slightly less than he raised prices. PHRASE: V inflects

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia

See PEEL.

Moby Thesaurus

IUD, SOB, bag, bastard, birth control device, bolus, bore, bugger, butt, buttonholer, capsule, condom, contraceptive, contraceptive foam, cough drop, crank, crashing bore, creep, cure, diaphragm, drag, drip, drug, dryasdust, dusty, fag, fart, flat tire, frightful bore, headache, heel, hood, hooligan, humdrum, intrauterine device, jerk, louse, lozenge, meanie, medicament, medication, medicine, mother, nuisance, oral contraceptive, pastille, pellet, pessary, pest, pharmaceutical, prophylactic, proser, rat, remedy, rubber, shit, shithead, shitheel, skin, smoke, spermicidal jelly, spermicide, stinkard, stinker, tablet, the pill, troche, turd, twaddler, wet blanket