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Pill vs Poll - What's the difference?

pill | poll |

As a noun pill

is a small, usually cylindrical object designed for easy swallowing, usually containing some sort of medication or pill can be the peel or skin or pill can be an inlet on the coast; a small tidal pool or bay.

As a verb pill

is (textiles) of a woven fabric surface, to form small matted balls of fiber or pill can be (label) to peel; to remove the outer layer of hair, skin, or bark.

As a proper noun poll is

or poll can be .

pill

English

Etymology 1

From (etyl) or (etyl) pille (whence (etyl) pil), probably from (etyl) pilula.

Noun

(en noun)
  • A small, usually cylindrical object designed for easy swallowing, usually containing some sort of medication.
  • * 1864 , Benjamin Ellis, The Medical Formulary [http://books.google.com/books?vid=OCLC14843090&id=pHoMvHRmrlIC&pg=PA170&lpg=PA170&dq=%22take+two+pills%22&as_brr=1]
  • Take two pills every hour in the apyrexia of intermittent fever, until eight are taken.
  • (senseid) Contraceptive medication, usually in the form of a pill to be taken by a woman; an oral contraceptive pill.
  • Jane went on the pill when she left for college.
    She got pregnant one month after going off the pill .
  • * 1986 , Jurriaan Plesman, Getting Off the Hook: Treatment of Drug Addiction and Social Disorders Through Body and Mind :
  • Many specialists are requesting that this vitamin be included in all contraceptive pills, as women on the pill have a tendency to be depressed.
  • (slang) A comical or entertaining person.
  • (slang) A contemptible, annoying, or unpleasant person.
  • * {{quote-book, year=1960
  • , author= , title=(Jeeves in the Offing) , section=chapter IV , passage=You see, he's egging Phyllis on to marry Wilbert Cream. [...] And when a man like that eggs, something has to give, especially when the girl's a pill like Phyllis, who always does what Daddy tells her.}}
  • * 2000 , Susan Isaacs, Shining Through [http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0061030155&id=6_1FJWFEYGoC&pg=PA172&lpg=PA172&dq=%22a+real+pill%22&sig=RCUR5O3MhNXeq8rMOnx9-LR5Mfo]
  • Instead, I saw a woman in her mid-fifties, who was a real pill ; while all the others had managed a decent “So pleased,” or even a plain “Hello,” Ginger just inclined her head, as if she was doing a Queen Mary imitation.
  • (informal) A small piece of any substance, for example a ball of fibres formed on the surface of a textile by rubbing.
  • * 1999 , Wally Lamb, I Know This Much Is True [http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0060987561&id=LOYeA9GmrEwC&pg=PA201&lpg=PA201&dq=%22sweater+pills%22&sig=U11GOkTpfHlqyGyIdk7ZNZ0GNuI]
  • One sleeve, threadbare and loaded with what my mother called “sweater pills ,” hung halfway to the floor.
  • A baseball.
  • * 2002 , John Klima, Pitched Battle: 35 of Baseball's Greatest Duels from the Mound [http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0786412038&id=G126RsLD3MsC&pg=PA44&lpg=PA44&dq=%22threw+the+pill%22&sig=NmyoxWN_bP5AHc9imVPMTxY7lvw]
  • Mr. Fisher contributed to the Sox effort when he threw the pill past second baseman Rath after Felsch hit him a comebacker.
  • (firearms) (informal) a bullet (projectile)
  • Synonyms
    * (small object for swallowing) tablet
    Derived terms
    * bitter pill to swallow * blue pill * chill pill * horse pill * morning-after pill * on the pill * pill beetle * pill bug * pill popper * red pill * sugar pill * pop pills

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • (textiles) Of a woven fabric surface, to form small matted balls of fiber.
  • * 1997 , Jo Sharp, Knitted Sweater Style: Inspirations in Color [http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN1561581895&id=l5h-cGU5HUYC&pg=PA11&lpg=PA11&dq=sweater+pilling&sig=6gfLWBL1QHVQZmbSYhJ4oipm8Kc]
  • During processing, inferior short fibers (which can cause pilling and itching) are removed to enhance the natural softness of the yarn and to improve its wash-and-wear performance.
  • To form into the shape of a pill.
  • Pilling is a skill rarely used by modern pharmacists.
  • To medicate with pills.
  • She pills herself with all sorts of herbal medicines.

    Etymology 2

    From (etyl) .

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • (label) To peel; to remove the outer layer of hair, skin, or bark.
  • To peel; to make by removing the skin.
  • *(Bible), (w) xxx. 37
  • *:[Jacob] pilled white streaksin the rods.
  • To be peeled; to peel off in flakes.
  • (label) To pillage; to despoil or impoverish.
  • *:
  • *:So syr Lucan departed for he was greuously wounded in many places And so as he yede he sawe and herkened by the mone lyght how that pyllars and robbers were comen in to the felde To pylle and robbe many a ful noble knyghte of brochys and bedys of many a good rynge & of many a ryche Iewel / and who that were not deed al oute
  • :(Spenser)
  • Noun

    (en noun)
  • The peel or skin.
  • * Holland
  • Some be covered over with crusts, or hard pills , as the locusts.

    Etymology 3

    From (etyl) . More at (l).

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • An inlet on the coast; a small tidal pool or bay.
  • ----

    poll

    English

    Etymology 1

    From (etyl) pol, polle . Meaning "collection of votes" is first recorded 1625, from notion of "counting heads".

    Alternative forms

    * pol, pole

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • An election or a survey of a particular group of people.
  • The student council had a poll to see what people want served in the cafeteria.
  • * Blackstone
  • All soldiers quartered in place are to remove and not to return till one day after the poll is ended.
  • A number or aggregate of heads; a list or register of individuals, especially electors.
  • * Shakespeare
  • We are the greater poll , and in true fear / They gave us our demands.
  • * Shakespeare
  • The muster file, rotten and sound, upon my life, amounts not to fifteen thousand poll .
  • (usually, as plural) A place where voters cast ballots.
  • The polls close at 8 p.m.
  • Hair
  • * 1883 ,
  • ...the doctor, as if to hear better, had taken off his powdered wig, and sat there, looking very strange indeed with his own close-cropped black poll .
  • The head, especially its top part.
  • * 1908 ,
  • And you might perceive the president and general manager, Mr. R. G. Atterbury, with his priceless polished poll , busy in the main office room dictating letters..
  • The broad or butt end of an axe or a hammer.
  • A fish, the pollard or European chub.
  • Synonyms
    * (election or survey) election, survey * (hair) hair
    Derived terms
    * opinion poll * polling * rolly polly * straw poll * tadpole

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To take, record the votes of (an electorate).
  • To solicit mock votes from (a person or group).
  • To vote at an election.
  • (Beaconsfield)
  • To register or deposit, as a vote; to elicit or call forth, as votes or voters.
  • He polled a hundred votes more than his opponent.
  • * Tickell
  • poll for points of faith his trusty vote
  • To cut off; to remove by clipping, shearing, etc.; to mow or crop.
  • to poll''' the hair; to '''poll''' wool; to '''poll grass
  • * Chapman
  • Who, as he polled' off his dart's head, so sure he had decreed / That all the counsels of their war he would ' poll off like it.
  • To cut the hair of (a creature).
  • * Bible, 2 Sam. xiv. 26
  • when he [Absalom] polled his head
  • * Sir T. North
  • His death did so grieve them that they polled themselves; they clipped off their horse and mule's hairs.
  • To remove the horns of (an animal).
  • To remove the top or end of; to clip; to lop.
  • to poll a tree
  • (transitive, computing, communication) To (repeatedly) request the status of something (such as a computer or printer on a network).
  • The network hub polled the department's computers to determine which ones could still respond.
  • (with adverb) To be judged in a poll.
  • * 2008 , Joanne McEvoy, The politics of Northern Ireland (page 171)
  • The election was a resounding defeat for Robert McCartney who polled badly in the six constituencies he contested and even lost his own Assembly seat in North Down.
  • (obsolete) To extort from; to plunder; to strip.
  • * Spenser
  • which polls and pills the poor in piteous wise
  • To impose a tax upon.
  • To pay as one's personal tax.
  • * Dryden
  • the man that polled but twelve pence for his head
  • To enter, as polls or persons, in a list or register; to enroll, especially for purposes of taxation; to enumerate one by one.
  • * Milton
  • polling the reformed churches whether they equalize in number those of his three kingdoms
  • (legal) To cut or shave smooth or even; to cut in a straight line without indentation.
  • a polled deed
    (Burrill)

    Adjective

    (head)
  • (of kinds of livestock which typically have horns) Bred without horns, and thus hornless.
  • Poll Hereford
    Red Poll cows
  • * 1757 , The monthly review, or, literary journal , volume 17, page 416:
  • Sheep, that is, the Horned sort, and those without Horns, called Poll Sheep [...]
  • * 1960 , Frank O'Loghlen, Frank H. Johnston, Cattle country: an illustrated survey of the Australian beef cattle industry, a complete directory of the studs , page 85:
  • About 15000 cattle, comprising 10000 Hereford and Poll' Hereford, 4000 Aberdeen Angus and 1000 Shorthorn and ' Poll Shorthorn, are grazed [...]
  • * 1970 , The Pastoral review , volume 80, page 457:
  • Otherwise, both horned and poll sheep continue to be bred from an inner stud.

    Etymology 2

    Perhaps a shortening of (Polly), a common name for pet parrots.

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A pet parrot.
  • Etymology 3

    From (etyl)

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (UK, dated, Cambridge University) One who does not try for honors at university, but is content to take a degree merely; a passman.
  • See also

    * gentleman's C

    References

    * English heteronyms ----