spool

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English spole, also spule,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Old French espole, the Old Northern French form, also spole, recorded from the 13th century,^[4][3][5][6] and directly borrowed from Middle Dutch spoele.^[5][3][7][2] The OED leaves open whether the English word came from French or from the Dutch source of the French word,^[4] Hoad and the Shorter Oxford name Middle Low German spōle as that source,^[8][9] and Dictionary.com takes the word from Middle Dutch or Middle Low German alone.^[10] The Germanic word is also seen in Dutch spoel, Old High German spuola, German Spule, Swedish spole and Icelandic spóla (“shuttle”),^{[4][3][5][11]} from Proto-Germanic *spōlǭ,^[1][5][3] and was borrowed into the Romance languages as French espoule, Spanish espolín and Italian spola.^[4] Hoad and the Shorter Oxford call it West Germanic, of unknown origin;^[8][9] Barnhart relates it to the Germanic word that gave spill,^[5] Merriam-Webster Unabridged probably to Old English speld (“a thin piece of wood used as a torch”),^[12] and Etymonline and Klein trace it to Proto-Indo-European *spel- (“to cleave, split”).^[3][13][1] The OED takes the spelling spole beside spool in the 18th century as a sign that the word was borrowed a second time from the Continent.^[4] The verb is from the noun.^[4][5][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

A small cylinder on which thread is wound as it is spun, especially for weaving; a weaver's bobbin: about 1325, in a gloss on Walter de Bibbesworth's French treatise.^[4][2] Barnhart dates the noun to before 1325,^[5] and Etymonline to the early 14th century.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The weaver's bobbin was used figuratively from 1605.^[4] Johnson (1755) still defined the word as a small piece of cane or reed with a knot at each end, or a piece of wood turned in that shape, to wind yarn on.^[14] In the 19th century it came to be the reel on which sewing thread is sold (1852, in Uncle Tom's Cabin) and then (1864) any cylinder on which cord, wire or tape is wound;^[4][3] it was also a mesh-pin in net-making (1837).^[4] The verb meant first to wind spools (1603, in Philemon Holland's Plutarch) and then to wind thread or film on a spool (1623);^[4][12] in computing, from 1967, it means to send data to temporary storage, from which a printer or other device takes it.^[4] The Oxford Dictionary of English explains this use as an acronym of simultaneous peripheral operation online.^[15] In Scots and northern English dialect a spool was also a weaver's shuttle and the thread in it.^[16]

Timeline

• c. 1325 – a weaver's bobbin.^[4][2]
• 1603 – verb, to wind spools.^[4][12] Etymonline dates the verb to about 1600.^[3]
• 1605 – in figurative use.^[4]
• 1623 – verb, to wind thread on a spool.^[4]
• 1837 – a mesh-pin used in making nets.^[4]
• 1852 – a reel for sewing thread.^[4]
• 1864 – any cylinder on which cord, wire or tape is wound.^[4][3]
• 1960 – the sliding part of a spool valve.^[4]
• 1967 – verb, in computing, to transfer data to temporary storage for a peripheral device.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. A cylinder with a rim at each end, on which thread, wire, tape or film is wound: She threaded the film onto the take-up spool.^[17][12][4]
2. A small reel of sewing thread; a bobbin.^[12][4]
3. The sliding part of a spool valve.^[4]

Verb

1. To wind something onto a spool, or to be wound onto or off one: The cable spooled off the drum.^[17][12][4]
2. (computing) To send data to temporary storage, from which a printer or other device takes it in turn.^[4][1]

Word family

• spooler
• spoollike
• unspool

Related words

• spill

Usage notes

In Scotland, Ulster and parts of northern and midland England dialect forms such as spole, spule and spoo were recorded around 1900.^[16] The OED also records a Scottish spool for wooden roofing shingles (1496), apparently an altered form of spune, spoon.^[4]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
6. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
7. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
8. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
11. ^ Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
12. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
13. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
14. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
15. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
16. ^ a b Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
17. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins