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Showing results for "gillie"

gillie

American  
[gil-ee] / ˈgɪl i /
Or gilly

noun

  1. Scot.

    1. a hunting or fishing guide.

    2. a male attendant or personal servant to a Highland chieftain.

  2. ghillie.


gillie British  
/ ˈɡɪlɪ /

noun

  1. an attendant or guide for hunting or fishing

  2. (formerly) a Highland chieftain's male attendant or personal servant

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Etymology

Origin of gillie

First recorded in 1590–1600, gillie is from the Scots Gaelic word gille lad, servant


Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

See Examples For:

He's what's known as a "gillie" and manages fishing along a stretch of the Wye – a river once famous for its Atlantic salmon fishing.

From BBC ● Apr. 26, 2026

First she lost her adored husband, Albert, and never got over it, and then John Brown, her beloved Scots gillie, died on her.

From New York Times ● Oct. 3, 2017

As a guest of Queen Victoria, Landseer went deerstalking with a gillie from Balmoral.

From Time Magazine Archive

How times have changed last week appeared when English papers suppressed the fact that a Scotch gillie had been caught under the eye by birdshot fired by a guest of J. P. Morgan.

From Time Magazine Archive

I’ll tell Willie he is your gillie, as it were, for the fishing.

From Christine A Fife Fisher Girl by Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr

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