Bowl

Part of speech: noun, verb

Pronunciation: /boʊl/

Definitions

1. A round, deep container used for holding food or liquids ; a playing area or competition in sports like bowling or American football
2. A curved vessel typically used for serving or preparing meals ; an organized event or designated zone where specific games are played or scored
3. A concave dish designed to contain substances such as soup or cereal ; a formal sports contest or marked area used in games involving rolling or throwing a ball

Etymology: The container and the ball share a root. Old English "bolla" meant a cup, pot, or beaker, and it descends from a Proto-Germanic word that covered both a round vessel and a ball. The sense of a hollow dish is the older one in English, while the sphere sense survives in Dutch "bol" ("ball, sphere, scoop") and German "Bolle" ("bulb"). The word has a second line of descent. Middle English also took a form from Old French "boule" ("ball"), which came from Latin "bulla," meaning a bubble, a stud, or any round object. Those two routes gave English a pair of doublets: "boule" and "pulla" come from the same Germanic root, while "poll," the head, comes from the Latin line. In other words, the head and the dish are cousins through a common idea of roundness.

Synonyms: dish, container, vessel, basin, cup

Antonyms: plate, flatware, board, surface, pan