thole

name

1. A surname.

noun

Etymology: Anglicization of Latin tholus (“cupola, dome, rotunda”), from Ancient Greek θόλος (thólos, “dome, vault”), further etymology uncertain but possibly cognate with θᾰ́λᾰμος (thắlămos, “bedroom; inner chamber”) and/or English dale. Doublet of tholus and tholos.

1. A cupola, a dome, a rotunda; a tholus.

   “Philostratus relates that the king's house in Babylon had a roof of brass, which shone like lightning, and that in that house there was a chamber, whose ceiling was a thole (that is, a concave hemisphere) made in imitation of some system of the heaven, and with sapphire-coloured stones, […] and from the thole were suspended four golden doves, or iynges, who were called the Tongues of the Gods.”

verb

Etymology: From Middle English thōle, from tholen, tholien, from Old English þolian, from Proto-West Germanic *þolēn, from Proto-Germanic *þulāną (“to suffer”), from Proto-Indo-European *telh₂- (“to bear, suffer; to support”), compare Norwegian Bokmål tåle.

1. To suffer.

   “Seventy beds keeps he there teeming mothers are wont that they lie for to thole and bring forth bairns hale so God’s angel to Mary quoth.”

   “That remark of Edith Van Tromp's, to the effect that the illusions would all be swept away, had its confirmation before we had tholed through the first week of our island captivity.”

2. To endure, to put up with, to tolerate.

   “Nor was long Poſſeſſion in molendino regio, of receiving Multures for all Corns of a Barony promiſcuouſly without exception of Teind, found to bring the Teind under a Thirlage, Except ſuch as tholed Fire and Water there.”

   “Before long Ailie was silent and white, while her mother rimed on about men and their ways. And then she could thole it no longer, but must go out and walk by the burn to cool her hot brow and calm her thoughts, while the witch indoors laughed to herself at her devices.”