tell
/tɛl/
Word Rarity
Common
Frequency: Zipf frequency 5.53 in modern English
4
Scrabble Score
4
Letters
1
Syllables
3
Unique Chars
Meaning
verb
Mental senses related to determining, reckoning, or perceiving
Intransitive verb; Transitive verb
verb
Mental senses related to determining, reckoning, or perceiving
Intransitive verb; Transitive verb
Example Sentences
- "All told, there were over a dozen. Can you tell time on a clock? He had untold wealth."
- "And in his lap a masse of coyne he told, And turned vpsidowne, to feede his eye A couetous desire with his huge threasury."
- "Well fare the Arabians, who so richly pay The things they traffic for with wedge of gold, Whereof a man may easily in a day Tell that which may maintain him all his life."
- "Only He who made them can tell the number of the stars, and mark the place of each in the order of the one great dominant spiral."
- "I can tell that you're thrilled."
- "You can tell you've struck a nerve when even the crowd stops laughing."
Etymology
From Middle English tellen (“to count, tell”), from Old English tellan (“to count, tell”), from Proto-West Germanic *talljan, from Proto-Germanic *taljaną, *talzijaną (“to count, enumerate”), from Proto-Germanic *talą, *talō (“number, counting”), from Proto-Indo-European *dol- (“calculation, fraud”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian tälle (“to say; tell”), West Frisian telle (“to count”), West Frisian fertelle (“to tell, narrate”), Dutch tellen (“to count”) and Dutch vertellen (“to tell”), Low German tellen (“to count”), German zählen, Faroese telja, Swedish tala (“to speak”). More at tale.
Origin
Word Breakdown
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /tɛl/
- British English: /tɛl/