quill.
The lower shaft of a feather, specifically the region lacking barbs.
Meaning & usage
The lower shaft of a feather, specifically the region lacking barbs.
A pen made from a feather.
Any pen.
He picked up his quill and wrote a poem.
A sharply pointed, barbed, and easily detached needle-like structure that grows on the skin of a porcupine or hedgehog as a defense against predators.
A thin piece of bark, especially of cinnamon or cinchona, curled up into a tube.
The pen of a squid.
The plectrum with which musicians strike the strings of certain instruments.
The tube of a musical instrument.
Something having the form of a quill, such as the fold or plain of a ruff, or (weaving) a spindle, or spool, upon which the thread for the woof is wound in a shuttle.
A quill drive, having a hollow shaft with another movable shaft inside it.
Where this word comes from
From late Middle English quyl, which is first attested in the early 15th century with the meanings "fragment of reed" and "shaft of a feather", probably from Low German and Middle Low German quiele, possibly ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *gʷelH- (“to pierce, stick”). Compare Middle High German kil (“large feather, quill”), which is derived from the Low German term.
To pierce with quills. (Usually in the passive voice, as be quilled or get quilled.)
To write.
To form fabric into small, rounded folds.
To decorate with quillwork.
To subject (a woman who is giving birth) to the practice of quilling (blowing pepper into her nose to induce or hasten labor).
Where this word comes from
From late Middle English quyl, which is first attested in the early 15th century with the meanings "fragment of reed" and "shaft of a feather", probably from Low German and Middle Low German quiele, possibly ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *gʷelH- (“to pierce, stick”). Compare Middle High German kil (“large feather, quill”), which is derived from the Low German term.
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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.