skull
/ˈskʌl/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
Northern England/skʊl/
skull noun: the main bones of the head considered as a unit; including the cranium, facial bones, and mandible. Also the obsolete form of school.
Noun
skull (plural skulls)
- The main bones of the head considered as a unit; including the cranium, facial bones, and mandible.
- All the time six or eight large Chinese gongs were being beaten by the vigorous arms of as many young men, producing such a deafening discord that I was glad to escape to the round house, where I slept very comfortably with half a dozen smoke-dried human skulls suspended over my head.1869, Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipelago, volume I, London: Macmillan and Co., page 110
- He was about to roar when, lying among the black sticks and straw under the cliff, he saw a whole skull—perhaps a cow's skull, a skull, perhaps, with the teeth in it. Sobbing, but absent-mindedly, he ran farther and farther away until he held the skull in his arms.1922 October 26, Virginia Woolf, chapter 1, in Jacob’s Room, Richmond, London: […] Leonard & Virginia Woolf at the Hogarth Press, →OCLC; republished London: The Hogarth Press, 1960, →OCLC
- These bones as a symbol for death; death's-head.
- Thine are these orbs of light and shade;
Thou madest Life in man and brute;
Thou madest Death; and lo, thy foot
Is on the skull which thou hast made.1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], “Prologue”, in In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC
- Thine are these orbs of light and shade;
- The mind or brain.
- My thoughts are flying around in my skull like fireflies in a jar, but all of a sudden I'm unbearably tired and can't stay awake.2006, Bart Yates, The Brothers Bishop
- A crust formed on the ladle, etc. by the partial cooling of molten metal.
- The crown of the headpiece in armour.
- A shallow bow-handled basket.
- The head or master of a college.
- Graduates […] will never forget that majestic stature, that massive brow, that commanding look, as its possessor paced the ante-chapel of his college, or took his seat of presidence among the skulls of Golgotha.1881, The Academy, page 407
Verb
skull (third-person singular simple present skulls, present participle skulling, simple past and past participle skulled)
- To hit in the head with a fist, a weapon, or a thrown object.
- To strike the top of (the ball).
- Monte swung so hard at the next ball that he skulled it straight right, into the pond: 8 in, 9 out.2002, Robert C. Knox, Golf Balls Are Female, page 148
- To drink everything that remains in a glass by upending it.
- She nearly skulled the next drink and, despite feeling a little woozy, she felt a lot better.2016, Karen Nolan, The Y Necklace
- That was at Jessica Eyre's sixteenth, and while nothing terrible had happened (I had skulled four Lemon Ruskis and fallen asleep in the garden), it was agreed by all that I had embarrassed myself.2021, Mary Fifield, Kristin Thiel, Fire & Water
Also used as
skull is also the obsolete form of school.
skull meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
skull in Hindi
- bones of the head: cranium and mandible
- कपाल kapāl
skull in Tamil
- bones of the head: cranium and mandible
- தலையோடு talaiyōṭu, மண்டையோடு maṇṭaiyōṭu
- death's-head, skull
- மண்டையோடு maṇṭaiyōṭu
- (figuratively) mind or brain
- மண்டை maṇṭai
skull in Marathi
- bones of the head: cranium and mandible
- कवटी kavṭī
skull in Urdu
- bones of the head: cranium and mandible
- کَپال kapāl, کاسَۂ سَر kāsa-yi sar
More languagesFewer languages
- skull in Bengali
- করোটি korōṭi
- skull in Telugu
- కపాలము kapālamu, పుర్రె purre
- skull in Malayalam
- തലയോട്ടി talayōṭṭi
- skull in Kannada
- ತಲೆಬುರುಡೆ taleburuḍe
- skull in Punjabi
- ਖੋਪਰੀ khoprī
- skull in Gujarati
- ખોપરી khoprī
- skull in Odia
- ମୁଣ୍ଡଖପୁରି muṇḍakhapuri, ଖପୁରି khapuri
- skull in Sanskrit
- कपाल kapāla
- skull in Sinhala
- ඔලුව oluwa, තට්ටය taṭṭaya, කබල kabala
- skull in Assamese
- লাওখোলা laükhüla
- skull in Nepali
- खप्पर khappar
- skull in Pashto
- کوپړۍ kopṛᶕy
- skull in Tagalog
- bungo
- skull in Arabic
- جُمْجُمَة jumjuma
- skull in Malay
- tengkorak, batok kepala, jumjumah
- skull in Indonesian
- tengkorak, jumjumah, batok kepala
- skull in Thai
- กะโหลก gà-lòok
- skull in Vietnamese
- sọ, đầu lâu
- skull in Myanmar
- ဦးခွံ u:hkwam
- Dhivehi
- ބޮލުގެ ނާށިގަނޑު boluge nāṣigaⁿḍu
Examples of skull in a sentence
- Phrenology involves feeling the bumps in the skull to determine an individual's psychological attributes.
- The lower jaw articulates with the skull at the temporomandibular joint.
- I'm hanged if I know how to get the idea through his thick skull!
Synonyms of skull
Forms of skull
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | skulls |
| alternative form | scull |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | skulls |
| present participle | skulling |
| past participle | skulled |
| past | skulled |
Origin of skull
From Middle English sculle, scolle (also schulle, scholle), probably from a dialectal form of Old Norse skalli (“bald head, skull”), itself probably related to Old English sċealu (“husk”), to Proto-Norse *ᛋᚲᚨᛚᛟ (*skalo), from Proto-Germanic *skallô; compare Finnish kallo. Compare Scots scull, Danish skal (“skull”) and skalle (“bald head, skull”), Norwegian skalle, Swedish skalle and especially dialectal Swedish skulle. Related to Old Norse skoltr (“brow”), skolptr (“muzzle, snout”), akin to Icelandic skoltur (“jaw”), dialectal Swedish skult, skulle (“dome, crown of the head, skull”), Norwegian Nynorsk skult, skolt (“cranium, head (of a hammer); crag; hub”), Middle Dutch scolle, scholle, Middle Low German scholle, schulle (“clod, sod”), and Scots skult, skolt. Compare also Old High German sciula, skiula (“skull”). Possibly related to Latin celsus (“lofty, high, tall”), collis (“hill”). Also related to Old Norse skǫllóttr, Icelandic sköllóttur, Old Swedish skallotter, Swedish skallig, Danish skaldet, Norwegian skallet (“bald”).
See school (“a multitude”).
Words formed from skull
- Beauchene skull
- cloverleaf skull
- crackskull
- crumbling skull rule
- deathskull
- exploded skull
- fist and skull
- fuckskull
- get it through one's skull
- get through one's thick skull
- hot-skull
- numbskull
- numskull
- out of one's skull
- popskull
- pseudo-skull
- rattleskull
- sapskull
- skull and bones
- skull and crossbones
- skull base disease
- skullbone
- skullcap
- skull-collecting ant
- skullcup
- skull drum
- skullet
- skull-fuck
- skullfucker
- skullful
- skullish
- skulllike
- skull-like
- skull-measurer
- skull-pan
- skullscape
- skull session
- skull splitter
- skull-splitter
- skull-splitting
- skull-thatcher
- Skull Valley
- skully
- sugar skull
- thickskull
- thin skull rule
- whip some skull on
Phrases with skull
- skull cap
- skull caps
- skull fuck
- skull drums
- skull fucking
- skull sessions
- thin skull rules
- skull base diseases
- whips some skull on
- crumbling skull rules
- whipped some skull on
- whipping some skull on
4 more phrasesFewer phrases
Words that rhyme with skull
4 more rhymesFewer rhymes
Questions about skull
- What does skull mean?
- Skull means the main bones of the head considered as a unit; including the cranium, facial bones, and mandible.
- What is skull in Hindi?
- Skull in Hindi is कपाल (kapāl). See Skull meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is skull?
- Skull can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce skull?
- Skull is pronounced /ˈskʌl/.
- What is the plural of skull?
- The plural of skull is skulls.
Words near skull in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: skull (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-skull.ogg.
Cite this entry: “skull.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/skull. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.