purl
noun
No English definition recorded for this entry.
L326139 on Wikidata ↗verb
- to flow in a circular current or motion
Wiktionary
Pronunciation: /pɜːl/ / [pʰəːɫ] / /pɝl/
noun
Etymology: Possibly from the pearl-like appearance caused by bubbles on the surface of the liquid.
- Ale or beer spiced with wormwood or other bitter herbs, regarded as a tonic.
“A double mug of purle.”
- Hot beer mixed with gin, sugar, and spices.
“Drank a glass of purl to recover appetite.”
“Drinking hot purl, and smoking pipes.”
verb
Etymology: From Old Norse purla (“to babble”), possibly ultimately from an imitative Germanic base related to Dutch polder, Norwegian puldra (“to gush”) and pulla (“to bubble”), Old English polr (“marsh”).
- To flow with a murmuring sound in swirls and eddies.
“Swift o'er the rolling pebbles, down the hills, / Louder and louder purl the falling rills.”
“There is a water-break formed by a small terrace of rock in mid-stream, and purling with a hollow, delicious monotone—an island of pebbles is above, with here and there smaller ones near the "forks."”
- To rise in circles, ripples, or undulations; to curl; to mantle.
“thin winding breath which purled up to the sky”