travail

[ truh-veyl, trav-eyl ]

noun

1. painfully difficult or burdensome work; toil.

   Synonyms: moil, labor

2. pain, anguish or suffering resulting from mental or physical hardship.

   Synonyms: agony, torment

3. the pain of childbirth.

verb (used without object)

1. to suffer the pangs of childbirth; be in labor.
2. to toil or exert oneself.

travail

/ ˈtræveɪl /

noun

1. painful or excessive labour or exertion
2. the pangs of childbirth; labour

verb

1. intr to suffer or labour painfully, esp in childbirth

Word History and Origins

Origin of travail¹

1200–50; (v.) Middle English travaillen < Old French travaillier to torment < Vulgar Latin *trepaliāre to torture, derivative of Late Latin trepālium torture chamber, literally, instrument of torture made with three stakes ( tri-, pale ² ); (noun) Middle English < Old French: suffering, derivative of travailler

Word History and Origins

Origin of travail¹

C13: from Old French travaillier , from Vulgar Latin tripaliāre (unattested) to torture, from Late Latin trepālium instrument of torture, from Latin tripālis having three stakes, from trēs three + pālus stake

Example Sentences

He sat glum and thoughtful, his mind in unproductive travail, until the captain was announced.

From Project Gutenberg

How terrible that perpetual recommencement, that ocean bed, those Danaïdes-like clouds, all that travail and weariness for no end!

From Project Gutenberg

From the laborious travail of his brain issued at length an odd mass of arabesques with which the walls were somehow covered.

From Project Gutenberg

My nine weary months of arduous travail and half-frantic anticipation were cruelly wasted.

From Project Gutenberg

He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied.

From Project Gutenberg

Related Words

• agony
• anguish
• tribulation
• woe