toil

1 of 3

noun (1)

1
: long strenuous fatiguing labor
2
archaic
b
: laborious effort
toilful adjective
toilfully adverb

toil

2 of 3

verb

toiled; toiling; toils

intransitive verb

1
: to work hard and long
2
: to proceed with laborious effort : plod

transitive verb

1
archaic : overwork
2
archaic : to get or accomplish with great effort
toiler noun

toil

3 of 3

noun (2)

1
: a net to trap game
2
: something by which one is held fast or inextricably involved : snare, trap
usually used in plural
caught in the toils of the law
Choose the Right Synonym for toil

work, labor, travail, toil, drudgery, grind mean activity involving effort or exertion.

work may imply activity of body, of mind, of a machine, or of a natural force.

too tired to do any work

labor applies to physical or intellectual work involving great and often strenuous exertion.

farmers demanding fair compensation for their labor

travail is bookish for labor involving pain or suffering.

years of travail were lost when the house burned

toil implies prolonged and fatiguing labor.

his lot would be years of back-breaking toil

drudgery suggests dull and irksome labor.

an editorial job with a good deal of drudgery

grind implies labor exhausting to mind or body.

the grind of the assembly line

Examples of toil in a Sentence

Noun (1) after years of toil in a sweatshop, Kim was finally able to start her own dressmaking business Verb workers toiling in the fields They were toiling up a steep hill. Noun (2) a married woman hopelessly caught in the toils of an extramarital affair
Recent Examples on the Web
Noun
Implementing a real-time prevention strategy helps conserve those resources for things other than toil and firefighting. Bob Tinker, Forbes, 9 Oct. 2024 After watching Walker Buehler tinker, toil and tumble through 10 troubling starts in his return from a second career Tommy John surgery this season, the Dodgers pitching coach had a simple message for the right-hander ahead of a bullpen session in St. Louis last month. Jack Harris, Los Angeles Times, 6 Sep. 2024
Verb
George’s mother nonetheless toils in noble service of that effort. Justin Chang, The New Yorker, 25 Oct. 2024 Those who survived the brutal voyages ended up toiling on plantations in inhumane conditions in the Americas, mainly in Brazil and the Caribbean, while others profited from their labor. Reuters, NBC News, 24 Oct. 2024 See all Example Sentences for toil 

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'toil.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

Etymology

Noun (1)

Middle English toile, from Anglo-French toyl, from toiller

Verb

Middle English, to argue, struggle, from Anglo-French toiller to make dirty, fight, wrangle, from Latin tudiculare to crush, grind, from tudicula machine for crushing olives, diminutive of tudes hammer; akin to Latin tundere to beat — more at contusion

Noun (2)

Middle French toile cloth, net, from Old French teile, Latin tela cloth on a loom — more at subtle

First Known Use

Noun (1)

14th century, in the meaning defined at sense 2

Verb

15th century, in the meaning defined at intransitive sense 1

Noun (2)

circa 1529, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Time Traveler
The first known use of toil was in the 14th century

Dictionary Entries Near toil

Cite this Entry

“Toil.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/toil. Accessed 4 Nov. 2024.

Kids Definition

toil

1 of 2 noun
: long hard labor

toil

2 of 2 verb
1
: to work hard and long
2
: to go on with effort
toiling up a steep hill
toiler noun
Etymology

Noun

Middle English toile "battle, argument," derived from early French toyl, "battle, disturbance, confusion," from toiller (verb) "make dirty, fight, wrangle," from Latin tudiculare "crush, grind," from tudicula "machine with hammers for beating olives," from tudes "hammer"

Word Origin
Even though we have machines to do much of our hard work today, much long, hard toil must still be done by hand. Our Modern English word toil, however, comes from a Latin word for a laborsaving machine. The ancient Romans built a machine for crushing olives to produce olive oil. This machine was called a tudicula. This Latin word was formed from the word tudes, meaning "hammer," because the machine had little hammers to crush the olives. From this came the Latin verb tudiculare, meaning "to crush or grind." Early French used this Latin verb as the basis for its verb, spelled toiller, which meant "to make dirty, fight, wrangle." From this came the noun toyl, meaning "battle, disturbance, confusion." This early French noun in time was taken into Middle English as toile, meaning "argument, battle." The earliest sense of our Modern English toil was "a long, hard struggle in battle." It is natural enough that in time this came to be used to refer to any long hard effort.

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