lull
/lʌl/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
Northern England/lʊl/
lull noun: a period of rest or soothing.
Noun
lull (plural lulls)
- A period of rest or soothing.
- A period of reduced activity; a respite.
- After this departure there is a lull—one can almost feel the weary station breathing thankfulness!—broken only by the car-sleeper departing at 10.25 from Platform 6 […]. There is normally another lull from 1.45 to 4.30 a.m. till the daily round begins again, […].1959 October, T. W. E. Roche, “Traffic Working at Dover Marine Station”, in Railway Magazine, page 682
- A period without waves or wind.
- […] during the lull, wind shifted to S. E. […]1839, The Nautical Magazine and Naval Chronicle for 1839, page 26
- After the lull the wind does not appear to have blown with any great strength […]1875, W. G. Wilson, Report of the Midnapore and Burdwan Cyclone of the 15th and 16th of October 1874, page 74
- An extended pause between sets of waves.
- It is advisable to leave the surf zone during the lull between sets of larger waves, waiting outside the surf zone for a lull.1992, John Warlaumont, The Noaa Diving Manual, page 19-19
- About 2 hours in, a long lull cleared everyone out, and then it started getting a little more consistent and pushing chest ta neck high.808surfer.com forum (password needed)
Verb
lull (third-person singular simple present lulls, present participle lulling, simple past and past participle lulled)
- To cause to rest by soothing influences; to compose; to calm
- To lull him soft a sleepe1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto V”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 30
- Such ſweet compulſion doth in muſick ly, / To lull the daughers of Neceſſity,1634, John Milton, “Arcades”, in Poems of Mr. John Milton, […], London: […] Ruth Raworth for Humphrey Mosely, […], published 1646, →OCLC, page 54
- To become gradually calm; to subside; to cease or abate.
- The storm lulled.
- To give somebody a false sense of security so that an unpleasant situation takes the person by surprise.
- They lulled us into thinking we still had time.
- […] similarly, the empiriocritics' opposition to religion was a fraud intended to lull the vigilance of the proletariat and lead it by different paths in the same direction as religious mythology.1978 [1976], Leszek Kołakowski, translated by P[aul] S[teven] Falla, Main Currents of Marxism, volume II: The Golden Age, Oxford: Clarendon Press, translation of Główne nurty marksizmu: rozwój (in...
Proper noun capitalized: Lull
Lull (plural Lulls)
- A surname.
lull meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali
lull in Hindi
- to lull, pacify
- बहकाना bahkānā
lull in Tamil
- to cause to rest
- தாலாட்டு tālāṭṭu, உறக்கு uṟakku, துயிற்று tuyiṟṟu
- to become gradually calm; to subside; to cease or abate
- அடங்கு aṭaṅku
lull in Urdu
- خاموشی, سکون کا دور, گھٹنا, کم ہونا, سکون حاصل ہونا, ڈھارس دینا
lull in Bengali
- শান্ত করা, ঘুম পাড়ানো, সাময়িক বিরতি
More languagesFewer languages
- lull in Malayalam
- താരാട്ടി ഉറക്കുക, സമാധാനപ്പെടുത്തുക, ശമിപ്പിക്കുക
- lull in Kannada
- ಕ್ಷಣಿಕ ಶಾಂತಿ, ಸ್ತಬ್ಧತೆ, ಕ್ಷೋಭೆ ಇಲ್ಲದ ಸ್ಥಿತಿ, ಒರಗಿಸು
- lull in Nepali
- लुल्ल
- lull in Persian
- لالا کردن lâlâ kardan
- lull in Thai
- กล่อม glɔ̀m
- lull in Vietnamese
- ru
Examples of lull in a sentence
- They lulled us into thinking we still had time.
- But it was only the convivial lull that was to precede a post-prandial storm.
- It is high and, after the gentle slopes lull you, hard to climb.
Synonyms of lull
Forms of lull
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | lulls |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | lulls |
| present participle | lulling |
| past participle | lulled |
| past | lulled |
| Proper noun | |
| plural | Lulls |
Origin of lull
From Middle English lullen, lollen. Originally, perhaps expressive in origin from la-la-la or lu-lu-lu sounds made in calming a child. Compare Finnish laulaa (“to sing”) and Hiligaynon lala (“to sing a lullaby”). Cognate with Scots lul, lule, loll (“to lull, put to sleep, howl, caterwaul”), Dutch lollen (“to sing badly, caterwaul”), Dutch lullen (“to chatter, prate, cheat, deceive”), Low German lullen (“to lull”), German lullen (“to lull”), Danish lulle (“to lull, sing to sleep”), Swedish lulla (“to lull”), Icelandic lúlla (“to lull”).
* As a German surname, from personal names based on Leute (“people, population”). * As a Catalan surname, spelling variant of Llull.
Words formed from lull
Words that rhyme with lull
4 more rhymesFewer rhymes
Questions about lull
- What does lull mean?
- Lull means a period of rest or soothing.
- What is lull in Hindi?
- Lull in Hindi is बहकाना (bahkānā). See Lull meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is lull?
- Lull can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce lull?
- Lull is pronounced /lʌl/.
- What is the plural of lull?
- The plural of lull is lulls.
Words near lull in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: lull (page history and authors); Lull (page history and authors); बहकाना (Hindi) (page history and authors); lull (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); Lull (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); lull (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); lull (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); lull (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-lull.wav, LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-lull.wav.
Cite this entry: “lull.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/lull. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.