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tombola

American  
[tom-buh-luh] / ˈtɒm bə lə /

noun

British.
  • tombolas
    plural
  1. house.


tombola British  
/ tɒmˈbəʊlə /

noun

  1. a type of lottery, esp at a fête, in which tickets are drawn from a revolving drum

"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

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

Etymology

Origin of tombola

1875–80; < Italian, derivative of tombolare to tumble, itself derivative of tombare to fall

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:

The conventional group campaign concludes in November, while the final trio will be tossed into the big Uefa tombola after play-offs in March next year.

From BBC Oct. 15, 2023

The head coach's selectorial tombola is not what it was.

From BBC Feb. 12, 2023

Not Without Hope Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson pulls three words out of a tombola machine at random.

From The Guardian Mar. 17, 2017

Mr. Carrozzini would drop by the Clementes’ to drink coffee and play the board game tombola, or meet on the rooftops to get filmmaking tips from Mr. Luhrmann, his neighbor.

From New York Times Sep. 28, 2016

To attract custom and push the sale of refreshments, the proprietor of the ball ends the Sunday hop with a tombola.

From The Life of the fly; with which are interspersed some chapters of autobiography by Alexander Teixeira de Mattos

Their way of keeping it holy, however, with tombolas, horse-races, and fire-works, strikes a heretic, to say the least, oddly.

From The Continental Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 6, June, 1862 Devoted To Literature and National Policy by Various

And lo! there are four tombolas: but we await them not.

From From the Oak to the Olive A Plain record of a Pleasant Journey by Julia Ward Howe

Fortunately, however, "tubs" recover their equilibrium almost as easily as tombolas, and "the Sylph" did not belie its character; so the freshman again assumed a proper position, and was shoved off with a boat-hook.

From Adventures of Mr. Verdant Green by Cuthbert Bede

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