teal

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English tele,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} which the OED takes as inherited from Old English *tǣle, an unrecorded word,^[7][2] inherited from Proto-West Germanic *taili.^[7][2] It is related to Middle Dutch tēling, teiling, Dutch taling and Middle Low German tēlink,^[7][5][8][9] derivatives of the same base; the OED finds a link with teling (“generation”) and telen (“to breed”) improbable.^[7] Hoad thinks the word ultimately imitates the bird's call,^[8] while the Shorter Oxford and the Oxford Dictionary of English call its origin unknown^[9][10] and Partridge suggests it may be a back-formation from the Dutch word.^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

A small freshwater duck: 1314, in the Wardrobe Accounts of Edward II,^[7] about 1300 in Etymonline and probably about 1300 in Barnhart.^[2][5]

Semantic evolution

By about 1475 teal also meant the bird's flesh as food,^[7] and Johnson (1755), quoting Carew's Survey of Cornwall, simply called it a wild fowl.^[12] From 1678, in Ray's translation of Willughby's Ornithology, it was used with a qualifier for related species, as in blue-winged teal and cinnamon teal.^[7][4] The colour sense, a dark greenish blue like the patches on the drake's head and wings, appears in 1923 in clothing advertisements.^[7][2] The plural is teal or teals.^[13][4]

Timeline

• 1314 – a small freshwater duck.^[7]
• c. 1475 – the flesh of the teal as food.^[7]
• 1678 – with a qualifier, related species of duck.^[7]
• 1923 – a dark greenish-blue colour.^[7][2]

Meanings

Noun

1. Any of several small freshwater ducks related to the mallard, especially the Eurasian Anas crecca: A flock of teal rose from the reeds.^[13][4][7]
2. A dark greenish-blue colour.^[13][7]

Word family

• common teal
• cinnamon teal
• green-winged teal
• blue-winged teal

Usage notes

Wright's dialect dictionary records unrelated dialect words of this spelling: in Devon and Cornwall teal meant to bury, in Scotland and Nottinghamshire to entice or wheedle, and in old Scots a busybody or mean fellow.^[14]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
4. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
6. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
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. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
12. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
13. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
14. ^ 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)