English[edit]

English Wikipedia has an article on:

gavel

Wikipedia

Pronunciation[edit]

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈɡa.vəl/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈɡæ.vəl/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Etymology 1[edit]

From Middle English gavel, from Old English gafol, from Proto-West Germanic *gabul, from Proto-Germanic *gabulą, from Proto-Germanic *gebaną (“to give”), equivalent to give +‎ -el.

Noun[edit]

gavel (countable and uncountable, plural gavels)

1. (historical) Rent.
2. (obsolete) Usury; interest on money.
3. (historical) An old Saxon and Welsh form of tenure by which an estate passed, on the holder's death, to all the sons equally; also called gavelkind.

Verb[edit]

gavel (third-person singular simple present gavels, present participle gaveling or gavelling, simple past and past participle gaveled or gavelled)

1. (transitive) To divide or distribute according to the gavel system.

Etymology 2[edit]

Origin obscure. Possibly an alteration of dialectal cavel, a variant of kevel (“a stone mason's axe with a flat face, a cleat or bollard”), from Middle English kevel (“a mason's hammer”), from Old Norse kefli (“a piece of wood, stick, cylinder, mangle”). Cognate with Norwegian kjevle (“rolling pin”).

Noun[edit]

gavel (plural gavels)

1. A wooden mallet, used by a courtroom judge, or by a committee chairman, struck against a sounding block to quieten those present, or by an auctioneer to accept the highest bid at auction.
   • 2019 January 2, Sheryl Gay Stolberg, “Nancy Pelosi, Icon of Female Power, Will Reclaim Role as Speaker and Seal a Place in History”, in New York Times‎^[1]:

     More than three decades later, Ms. Pelosi is all but assured on Thursday of reclaiming her former title as speaker of the House, the first lawmaker in more than half a century to hold the office twice. With the gavel in hand, she will cement her status as the highest-ranking and most powerful elected woman in American political history.

2. (metonymically, chiefly US) The legal system as a whole.
3. A mason's setting maul.^[1]

Derived terms[edit]

• gavel-to-gavel

Translations[edit]

Verb[edit]

gavel (third-person singular simple present gavels, present participle gaveling or gavelling, simple past and past participle gaveled or gavelled)

1. To use a gavel.

   The judge gavelled for order in the courtroom after the defendant burst out with a confession.

Usage notes[edit]

• In US English, the participles are gaveled and gaveling; in British, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand English they are gavelled and gavelling.

Derived terms[edit]

• gavel out
• gavel to order

Translations[edit]

Etymology 3[edit]

Old French gavelle (cf. Modern French javelle) probably diminutive from Latin capulus (“handle”), from capere (“to lay hold of, seize”); or compare Welsh gafael (“hold, grasp”). Compare heave.

Noun[edit]

gavel (plural gavels)

1. A small heap of grain, not tied up into a bundle.
   • 1857, United States Patent Office, Commissioner of Patents Annual Report:

     The combination with a mechanical rake of the roof or screen herein described, or the equivalent thereof, to intervene and keep the gavel of grain collected on the platform separated during its discharge

Translations[edit]

Etymology 4[edit]

Noun[edit]

gavel (plural gavels)

1. (Scotland, archaic, architecture) A gable.

References[edit]

Anagrams[edit]

• glave

Swedish[edit]

Noun[edit]

gavel c

1. (architecture) a gable, a short wall of a building
2. (idiomatic, in "stå på vid gavel") to be wide open (of a door or the like)

   Synonym: (adjective) vidöppen

   Dörren stod på vid gavel

   The door was wide open

Declension[edit]

Related terms[edit]

• husgavel

References[edit]

• gavel in Svensk ordbok (SO)
• gavel in Svenska Akademiens ordlista (SAOL)
• gavel in Svenska Akademiens ordbok (SAOB)