dole

dole¹ share; unemployment benefit

Etymology

The share or portion is inherited from Middle English dol,^[2][3] inherited from Old English dāl (“division, portion, share”),^{[4][3][5][6][7]} which Etymonline and Barnhart take as shortened from gedāl (“portion”).^[8][9] It is a parallel form to dǣl, the source of deal.^{[10][9][11][12]} It goes back to Proto-Germanic *dailą (“share, part”),^[13][6] also the source of Old Frisian dēl, Old Saxon dēl, Middle Dutch deil, Dutch deel, Old High German teil, German Teil and Gothic 𐌳𐌰𐌹𐌻𐍃 (dails).^[9][8][13] Kroonen calls it a word shared by Germanic and Balto-Slavic, with Slavic words for "part" beside it.^[13] Etymonline reports Watkins's derivation from Proto-Indo-European *dail- (“to divide”), an extended form of Proto-Indo-European *dā- (“to divide”), and Boutkan's view that it is most probably a substrate word in Germanic.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

In Old English, dāl meant the state of being divided, a division, or a part of a whole: Ælfric's Exodus uses it for the division set between two peoples.^[10][7] The Middle English form is recorded before 1225 for a share allotted to one,^[10] and Barnhart dates dol, a part allotted, to about 1200.^[9]

Semantic evolution

Ayto and the Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins trace a narrowing from "part, portion" to a portion of food or money handed out in charity, by the 14th century.^[14][15] The OED records the dealing out of gifts from about 1275, in Laȝamon's Brut, and the gift itself from 1362, in Piers Plowman.^[10] Doles were often given at funerals;^[11] in Lancashire dialect a dole was a penny given to every child or poor person who came to a house where there was a funeral.^[16] From about 1520 the word also meant one's lot in life, chiefly in the Tudor proverb happy man be his dole,^[10][11] which Weekley quotes from Heywood (1562): "Happy man, happy dole".^[11] In the north of England and Scotland a dole was also a share of a common field.^[17][10] Trench (1859) noted that the word had come to imply a scanty portion, and the verb a reluctant handing out.^[18] The verb, to give as alms, is recorded from 1465,^[10][9] and "to give out sparingly" from 1749, in Fielding's Tom Jones;^[10][8] Ayto calls dole out an 18th-century development.^[14] From 1919 the dole became the popular British name for state payments to the unemployed,^[8][5] and on the dole is first recorded in the 1920s.^[14][8]

Timeline

• before 1000 – dāl, division, a part or share.^[9][10]
• c. 1200 – dol, a part allotted.^[9][8]
• before 1225 – one's share or portion (now archaic).^[10]
• c. 1275 – a distribution of gifts, especially in charity.^[10][8]
• 1362 – a gift of food or money in charity.^[10]
• 1465 – verb, to give as alms.^[10][9]
• c. 1520 – one's lot or fate, in happy man be his dole.^[10]
• 1749 – verb, to give out in small quantities.^[10][8]
• 1919 – the dole, state payments to the unemployed in Britain.^[8]
• 1920s – on the dole.^[14][8]

Meanings

Noun

1. the dole (chiefly British, informal): money paid by the state to people who are out of work.^[19][17] On the dole means receiving it: He spent a year on the dole after the mill closed.^[19][17][3]
2. A distribution of food, money or clothing to the needy; also, a gift so given.^[19][3][10]
3. A small or grudging portion.^[19][10]
4. (archaic) One's allotted share or portion.^[3][10][17]
5. (archaic) One's lot in life; fate: happy man be his dole.^[3][19][10]

Verb

1. To give out in small portions, usually with out: The nurse doled out the biscuits two at a time.^[19][3][10]
2. To give as charity.^[3][10][17]

Word family

• dole out
• dole queue
• dole bludger

dole² grief, sorrow

Etymology

The word for grief is inherited from Middle English dol, also doel, duel and del,^[2][3][6] borrowed from Old French dol, also doel and duel,^{[6][3][9][20]} which the Anglo-Norman Dictionary records from the early 12th century for pain, grief and sorrow.^[21] The French word, now deuil (“mourning”), comes from Late Latin dolus (“grief”),^{[6][20][4][17]} from Latin doleō (“to feel pain, grieve”).^{[4][9][20][17]} Merriam-Webster takes the Late Latin noun as an alteration of dolor (“pain, grief”), influenced by dolus (“fraud, deceit”).^[3] Klein traces the Latin verb to Proto-Indo-European *del- (“to split, cut”), with an original sense "to be torn".^[20] It has cognates in Italian duolo, Old Occitan dol and Spanish duelo.^[20]

Earliest recorded meaning

Grief, sorrow: about 1225, in the form dol.^[9] The Shorter Oxford dates it to Middle English,^[17] and Merriam-Webster to the 13th century.^[3]

Semantic evolution

In Middle English the word also meant mourning and lamentation, chiefly in make dole, and a cause of grief.^[17][2] From the early 16th to the mid 18th century it could mean clothes worn in mourning.^[17] From the mid 16th century it also meant a funeral, a sense that survived only in dialect.^[17] The verb dole, to grieve or lament, came separately from doloir and is recorded from before 1400 to 1668.^[10][3] By the 19th century the noun was archaic or poetic, kept mainly in doleful;^[11][17] Weekley notes that the Scots form dule was taken up by some modern poets.^[11] In Scots and northern English dialect dool or dule still meant sorrow, grief or misfortune: "Muckle was the dool and care that came o't" (Scott, 1824).^[16]

Timeline

• c. 1225 – grief, sorrow.^[9][3]
• before 1400 – verb dole, to grieve (obsolete by 1668).^[10]
• early 16th century – clothes worn in mourning (until the mid 18th century).^[17]
• mid 16th century – a funeral (later only in dialect).^[17]

Meanings

Noun

1. (archaic) Grief or sorrow.^[3][17][19]
2. (archaic) Mourning or lamentation.^[17][2]
3. (obsolete) Clothes worn in mourning.^[3][17]

Word family

• doleful
• dolesome