Beal
//biːl// name, noun, verb
name, noun, verb ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
Noun
- 1 A small inflammatory tumor; pustule. dialectal, obsolete
Verb
- 1 To gather matter; swell; come to a head, as a pimple; fester; suppurate. Pennsylvania, Scotland, Western, dialectal
- 2 To bellow, roar, or shout. UK, dialectal
Proper Noun
- 1 A surname from Anglo-Norman.
- 2 A small village in Kyloe parish, Northumberland, England (OS grid ref NU0642).
- 3 A village and civil parish in North Yorkshire, England, previously in Selby district (OS grid ref SE5325).
- 4 An unincorporated community in Vincennes Township, Knox County, Indiana, United States.
Example
More examples"Tom spent 30 years trying to prove the Beal conjecture."
Etymology
Etymology 1
From Middle English beel, bele, from Old English bȳle (“boil, carbuncle, bile”), from Proto-West Germanic *būlijā, from Proto-Germanic *būlijǭ (“swelling”), from *būlǭ (“swelling, bump, boil”). More at boil.
Etymology 2
From Middle English belen, from bele (see above).
Etymology 3
From Middle English belien, from Old Norse belja (“to bellow, roar”).
Etymology 4
Named after several places in England, from Old English beo (“bee”) + hyll (“hill”).
Related phrases
More for "beal"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.