Word.ws English Dictionary

byspel

byspel noun: an example.

Noun

byspel (plural not attested)

  1. (no plural, nonstandard, rare) An example.
    • I don't like using ð for most words at the beginning of the word simply because ð looks like a d and huru Ð looks like a D and would encourage people using the “d” instead of “th” for byspel: “dat” instead of “that” … and others.2011, Michael Everson, The Oxford English Dictionary on eð
    • As far as Rostam could tell, the only thing needed to enlist in the Legion was a heartbeat. A byspel of this was that the Army carefully screen'd their soldiers for AIDS and regularly tested everyone for it owing to the likelihood of blood transfusions straight from one soldier to another on the...2015, LT Wolf, The World King - Book I: The Reckoning

Origin of byspel

From Middle English byspel, bispel, from Old English biġspel, bīspel (“a proverb; pattern; example”), equivalent to by- + spell (“talk, saying, discourse, story”). Compare Scots byspel (“byword; rarety; outcast”), Saterland Frisian Biespil (“example; pattern”), Middle Dutch bijspel (“proverb; parable”), German Low German Bispill (“example”), German Beispiel (“example”).

Questions about byspel

What does byspel mean?
Byspel means an example.
What part of speech is byspel?
Byspel is a noun.

Words near byspel in the dictionary

  1. bysmaliths
  2. Bysouth
  3. Bysouths
  4. byspeech
  5. byspeeches
  6. byspel
  7. byssaceous
  8. byssal
  9. byssally
  10. byssate
  11. byssi

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: byspel (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-byspel.ogg.

Cite this entry: “byspel.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/byspel. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.