pell

• IPA^(key): /pɛl/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛl

From Latin pellis (“animal skin, pelt”), from Proto-Italic *pelnis, from Proto-Indo-European *pel-ni-. Distantly related to fell and film.

pell (plural pells)

1. A fur or hide.
2. A lined cloak or its lining.
3. A roll of parchment; a record kept on parchment.
   • 1835, Frederick Devon (editor and translator), Issue Roll of Thomas de Brantingham, Bishop of Exeter, Lord High Treasurer of England, Containing Payments Made out of His Majesty′s Revenue in the 44th Year of King Edward III.: A.D. 1370, page xi,

     The clerk of the pell (whose office is in the Lord Treasurer′s gift) keepeth the Pells in parchment, called Pelles Receptæ, wherein every teller′s bill, with his name on it, is to be entred; and under every such bill when it is entred, recordatur to be written in open court, for a controlment to charge the teller with so much money as in the said bill is set downe.

     He also anciently kept another pell, called Pellis Exitus, wherein every dayes issuing of any the moneys paid into the receipt, was to be entered, and by whom and by what warrant, privy seale, or bill, it was paid.

4. (Sussex) A body of water somewhere between a pond and a lake in size.
5. An upright post, often padded and covered in hide, used to practice strikes with bladed weapons such as swords or glaives.

• clerk of the pells

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

pell (third-person singular simple present pells, present participle pelling, simple past and past participle pelled)

1. (transitive, obsolete) To pelt; to knock about.
   • 1601, C[aius] Plinius Secundus [i.e., Pliny the Elder], “[Book I.]”, in Philemon Holland, transl., The Historie of the World. Commonly Called, The Naturall Historie of C. Plinius Secundus. […], (please specify |tome=1 or 2), London: […] Adam Islip, →OCLC:

     Beat and pell them downe with perches and poles.

• pell-mell

Cognate with Welsh pell (“far”).

pell

1. far

Inherited from Old Catalan pell~peyl, from Latin pellem, from Proto-Italic *pelnis, from Proto-Indo-European *pel- (“to cover, wrap; skin, hide; cloth”).

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic, Valencia) [ˈpeʎ]

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  (file)

• Rhymes: -eʎ

pell f (plural pells)

1. (anatomy) skin
2. pelt

• “pell”, in Diccionari de la llengua catalana [Dictionary of the Catalan Language] (in Catalan), second edition, Institute of Catalan Studies [Catalan: Institut d'Estudis Catalans], April 2007
• “pell”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2025.
• “pell” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
• “pell” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.

From Middle Cornish pell, from Proto-Brythonic *pell, from Proto-Celtic *kʷelsos, from Proto-Indo-European *kʷelsós, from *kʷel- (“to turn; to revolve around, sojourn”). Cognate with Welsh pell and Breton pell.

• IPA^(key): /ˈpɛlː/

pell (comparative pella, superlative an pella)

1. far, distant
2. long (of time)

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  (file)

pell

1. singular imperative of pellen
2. (colloquial) first-person singular present of pellen

From Proto-Celtic *kʷelsos, from Proto-Indo-European *kʷelsós,^[1] from *kʷel- (“to turn; to revolve around, sojourn”).^[2] Compare Ancient Greek τέλος (télos, “end, boundary, completion”) for a similar semantic development from the same root.

• (North Wales) IPA^(key): /pɛɬ/
• (South Wales) IPA^(key): /peːɬ/, /pɛɬ/
• Rhymes: -ɛɬ

pell (feminine singular pell, plural pell, equative pelled, comparative pellach, superlative pellaf)

1. far, distant

• mor belled (“so far”)
• rheolydd pell, teclyn rheoli o bell (“remote control”)
• pellter (“distance”)
• y Dwyrain Pell (“the Far East”)