Bowls

Part of speech: noun, verb

Pronunciation: /bəʊlz/

Definitions

1. Containers that are round and open at the top, used for holding food or liquids ; the action of rolling or throwing a ball in various sports aiming to knock down pins or reach a target
2. Round receptacles typically used to serve or prepare food ; propelling a ball along the ground toward pins or another object in competitive activities
3. Circular vessels designed to contain substances such as food or drink ; the act of delivering a ball in games like cricket or bowling for scoring purposes

Etymology: The English word "bowl" for a round vessel comes from Old English "bolla", meaning cup, pot or beaker, and its ancestor "bullǭ" meant "ball" or "round vessel" in early Germanic. The sense of a ball and the sense of a container were once a single idea: a rounded thing. Cognates across the Germanic languages still show this, with Dutch "bol" meaning both ball and scoop, and German "Bolle" meaning bulb. English also picked up a second, separate route. Middle English "bowle" and "boule" came from Old French "boule", "ball", which descended from Latin "bulla", meaning bubble, stud or round object. That French-Latin strand is a doublet, meaning two forms of one ancestor that entered English by different paths. The lineage is what gives the sporting sense its round-object root, since the game of rolling a ball toward a target shares that same origin.

Synonyms: dishes, basins, vessels, containers, receptacles