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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

billow.

A large wave, swell, surge, or undulating mass of something, such as water, smoke, fabric or sound.

6 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈbɪl.oʊ/Canada, General-American/ˈbɪl.əʊ/California, Received-Pronunciation/ˈbɪl.əʉ/Australia/ˈbɪl.loː(w)/South-Asia

  1. A large wave, swell, surge, or undulating mass of something, such as water, smoke, fabric or sound.

Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *bʰelǵʰ-der. Proto-Germanic *belganą Proto-Germanic *bulgijō Old Norse bylgjabor. Middle English *bilwe English billow From Middle English *bilwe, borrowed from Old Norse bylgja, from Proto-Germanic *bulgijō. Cognates include Danish bølge (“wave”); Norwegian Bokmål bølge (“wave”), Norwegian Nynorsk bylgje (“wave”); Swedish bölja (“wave”); German Low German Bulge, Bulg, Bülg (“billow, wave”); German Bulge (“billow, wave”). Compare bellow, bawl.

verb/ˈbɪl.oʊ/Canada, General-American/ˈbɪl.əʊ/California, Received-Pronunciation/ˈbɪl.əʉ/Australia/ˈbɪl.loː(w)/South-Asia

  1. To surge or roll in billows.

  2. To swell out or bulge.

Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *bʰelǵʰ-der. Proto-Germanic *belganą Proto-Germanic *bulgijō Old Norse bylgjabor. Middle English *bilwe English billow From Middle English *bilwe, borrowed from Old Norse bylgja, from Proto-Germanic *bulgijō. Cognates include Danish bølge (“wave”); Norwegian Bokmål bølge (“wave”), Norwegian Nynorsk bylgje (“wave”); Swedish bölja (“wave”); German Low German Bulge, Bulg, Bülg (“billow, wave”); German Bulge (“billow, wave”). Compare bellow, bawl.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.