pail
UK/peɪl/
pail noun: a vessel of wood, tin, plastic, etc., usually cylindrical and having a handle -- used especially for carrying liquids, for example water or milk; a bucket (sometimes with a cover).
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Noun
pail (plural pails)
- A vessel of wood, tin, plastic, etc., usually cylindrical and having a handle -- used especially for carrying liquids, for example water or milk; a bucket (sometimes with a cover).
- The milkmaid carried a pail of milk in each hand.
- Jack and Jill
Went up the hill.
To fetch a pail of water,
Jack fell down,
And broke his crown,
And Jill came tumbling after.1810, Jack and Jill, and old Dame Gill, York: J. Kendrew
- Synonyms:
- bucket
- A closed (covered) cylindrical shipping container.
pail meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Malayalam and Kannada
pail in Tamil
- வாளி
pail in Urdu
- بالٹی
pail in Malayalam
- ബക്കറ്റ്, തൊട്ടി, പാത്രം, തമല
pail in Kannada
- ಕೊಳಗ, ಬಕೀಟು
More languagesFewer languages
- pail in Sanskrit
- कोश kóśa
- pail in Pashto
- سلواغه salwāǧa
Examples of pail in a sentence
- Hallam took a can of Molson Export out of the lunch pail.
- “Ryan, borrow me your lunch pail so we can fill it with blueberries.
- And a gorgeous slop pail covered in the proverbial violets, would you believe?”
Synonyms of pail
Forms of pail
| plural | pails |
|---|
Origin of pail
From Middle English payle (“bucket, pail, milking pail”), of uncertain origin. Likely from Old English pæġel (“wine vessel, container for liquids, pail; a liquid measure”), from Proto-West Germanic *pagil, from Proto-Indo-European *bak- (“peg, club”), equivalent to peg + -le. Compare West Frisian pegel (“liquid measure, fourth of a litre, half-pint”), German Pegel (“level of liquid, level”), Middle Dutch pegel (“half-pint”), Danish pægl (“half-pint”). Doublet of peil. Alternatively from Old French paielle (“frying pan, warming pan; a liquid measure”), from Latin patella (“small pan, shallow dish, platter”), diminutive of patina (“broad shallow pan, stewpan”). Perhaps a conflation of both.
Words formed from pail
Phrases with pail
Words that rhyme with pail
48 more rhymesFewer rhymes
- veil
- pale
- avail
- wale
- whale
- bail
- hail
- yale
- bale
- snail
- travail
- brail
- exhale
- frail
- jail
- prevail
- swale
- vail
- wail
- derail
- dwale
- entail
- flail
- Gail
- gayle
- impale
- kale
- quail
- regale
- spale
- thumbnail
- white whale
- ale
- curtail
- drail
- gale
- inhale
- retail
- shale
- tael
- unveil
- ail
- all hail
- assail
- ayel
- beyond the pale
- braille
- cakes and ale
Questions about pail
- What does pail mean?
- Pail means a vessel of wood, tin, plastic, etc., usually cylindrical and having a handle -- used especially for carrying liquids, for example water or milk; a bucket (sometimes with a cover).
- What is pail in Tamil?
- Pail in Tamil is வாளி. See Pail meaning in Tamil.
- What part of speech is pail?
- Pail is a noun.
- How do you pronounce pail?
- Pail is pronounced /peɪl/ (UK).
- What is the plural of pail?
- The plural of pail is pails.
Words near pail in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: pail (page history and authors); pail (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); pail (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); pail (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); pail (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); कोश (Sanskrit) (page history and authors); سلواغه (Pashto) (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-pail.ogg.
Cite this entry: “pail.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/pail. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.