drill

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See also: Drill

English

Pronunciation

  • enPR: drĭl, IPA(key): /dɹɪl/,
  • Audio (US)(file)
  • Rhymes: -ɪl

Etymology 1

From Middle Dutch drillen (“bore, move in a circle”).

Verb

drill (third-person singular simple present drills, present participle drilling, simple past and past participle drilled)

  1. (transitive) To create (a hole) by removing material with a drill (tool).
    Synonyms: excavate, bore, gouge; see also Thesaurus:make a hole
    Drill a small hole to start the screw in the right direction.
  2. (intransitive) To practice, especially in (or as in) a military context.
    They drilled daily to learn the routine exactly.
    • 2017 May 13, Barney Ronay, “Antonio Conte’s brilliance has turned Chelsea’s pop-up team into champions”, in the Guardian‎:
      On his return the team that faced Hull City had been reconfigured. Moses wasn’t overly drilled, just told he would be playing right wing-back, that Conte had seen enough to know.
  3. (ergative) To cause to drill (practice); to train in military arts.
    The sergeant was up by 6:00 every morning, drilling his troops.
    • 1859, Thomas Macaulay, Life of Frederick the Great:
      He [Frederic the Great] drilled his people, as he drilled his grenadiers.
  4. (transitive) To repeat an idea frequently in order to encourage someone to remember it.
    The instructor drilled into us the importance of reading the instructions.
  5. (intransitive, figurative) To investigate or examine something in more detail or at a different level
    Drill deeper and you may find the underlying assumptions faulty.
  6. (transitive) To hit or kick with a lot of power.
    • 2006, Joe Coon, The Perfect Game:
      He did get their attention when he drilled the ball dead center into the hole for an opening birdie.
    • 2007, Craig Cowell, Muddy Sunday:
      Without compromising he drilled the ball home, leaving Dynamos' ill-fated keeper diving for fresh air.
    • 2010 December 29, Chris Whyatt, “Chelsea 1 - 0 Bolton”, in BBC‎:
      Bolton were then just inches from taking the lead, but the dangerous-looking Taylor drilled just wide after picking up a loose ball following Jose Bosingwa's poor attempted clearance.
  7. (baseball) To hit someone with a pitch, especially in an intentional context.
  8. (slang, vulgar) To have sexual intercourse with; to penetrate.
    Synonyms: plow, poke, root, shaft; see also Thesaurus:copulate with
    • 2010, MasseMord (lyrics and music), “Masshealing Masskilling”:
      Everytime when I rape your daughter. Your beautiful faces expressing how it hurts. Always while I drill her c*nt. I want to see you dead.
    • 2012, SwizZz (lyrics and music), “Flu Shot”:
      Guess I'll be drilling her butt
  9. (slang) To shoot; to kill.
    Synonym: drill up
Derived terms
Translations
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Noun

drill (plural drills)

a battery-powered electric drill (sense 1)
  2. A tool or machine used to remove material so as to create a hole, typically by plunging a rotating cutting bit into a stationary workpiece.
    Wear safety glasses when operating an electric drill.
  3. The portion of a drilling tool that drives the bit.
    Use a drill with a wire brush to remove any rust or buildup.
  4. An activity done as an exercise or practice (especially a military exercise), particularly in preparation for some possible future event or occurrence.
    Regular fire drills can ensure that everyone knows how to exit safely in an emergency.
    • 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter VII, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y., London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:
      “ […] if you call my duds a ‘livery’ again there'll be trouble. It's bad enough to go around togged out like a life saver on a drill day, but I can stand that 'cause I'm paid for it. What I won't stand is to have them togs called a livery. […] ”
  5. A short and highly repeatable sports training exercise designed to hone a particular skill that may be useful in competition.
    At today's practice, the football team performed a variety of goalkeeping drills.
  6. Any of several molluscs, of the genus Urosalpinx and others, especially the oyster drill (Urosalpinx cinerea), that make holes in the shells of their prey.
  8. (uncountable, music) A style of trap music with gritty, violent lyrics, originating on the South Side of Chicago.
    • 2012 October 4, Jon Caramanica, “Chicago Hip-Hop’s Raw Burst of Change”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN:
      Though the young women of Chicago’s drill scene can be as rowdy as their male counterparts, they’re also more diverse in subject matter and point to a possible way forward.
    • 2022 February 18, Wilfred Chan, “Eric Adams meets with the drill rappers whose music he said he wanted to ban”, in The Guardian‎:
      New York City mayor Eric Adams held a summit with a group of drill rappers on Tuesday night and clarified he doesn’t actually want to ban their music, days after he appeared to blame the music scene for the recent shooting deaths of two young New York rappers and suggested drill videos be pulled from the internet.
    • 2022, W. David Marx, chapter 10, in Status and Culture, Viking, →ISBN:
      Between ticky off-kilter rhythms and otherworldly digital voice processing, the experimental hip-hop genres trap and drill have delivered radical hymns from alien planets.
Derived terms
Translations

Related terms

Further reading

Etymology 2

Perhaps the same as Etymology 3; compare German Rille which can also mean "small furrow".

Noun

drill (plural drills)

  1. An agricultural implement for making holes for sowing seed, and sometimes so formed as to contain seeds and drop them into the hole made.
    • 1993, John Banville, Ghosts:
      I found down at the side of the house the remains of what must have once been a kitchen garden. Everything was choked with weeds and scutch grass, but the outlines of bed and drill were still there.
  2. A light furrow or channel made to put seed into, when sowing.
  3. A row of seed sown in a furrow.
Derived terms
Translations

Verb

drill (third-person singular simple present drills, present participle drilling, simple past and past participle drilled)

  1. (transitive) To sow (seeds) by dribbling them along a furrow or in a row.
Translations

Etymology 3

Uncertain. Compare the same sense of trill, and German trillen, drillen. Attestation predates Etymology 1.

Noun

drill (plural drills)

  1. (obsolete) A small trickling stream; a rill.
    • c. 1635, George Sandys:
      Springs through the pleasant meadows pour their drills.
Translations

Verb

drill (third-person singular simple present drills, present participle drilling, simple past and past participle drilled)

  1. (transitive) To cause to flow in drills or rills or by trickling; to drain by trickling.
    waters drilled through a sandy stratum
    • 1615, George Sandys, “(please specify the page)”, in The Relation of a Iourney Begun An: Dom: 1610. , London: [Richard Field] for W. Barrett, →OCLC:
      Now it is a great square profunditie ; greene , and uneven at the bottome : into which a barren spring doch drill from betweene the stones of the North - ward wall
Translations

Etymology 4

From Middle English drillen (“to delay, defer, put off”), of origin unknown.

Verb

drill (third-person singular simple present drills, present participle drilling, simple past and past participle drilled)

  1. (transitive, obsolete or dialectal) To protract, lengthen out; fritter away, spend (time) aimlessly.
    Quit purposely drilling out the time hoping that someone else will do your chores.
  2. (transitive, obsolete or dialectal) To entice or allure; to decoy; with on.
    Synonyms: entice, lead on, lure
    • 1711 June 12, Joseph Addison, The Spectator, number 89; republished in The Works of Joseph Addison, volume 1, New York: Harper & Brothers, 1842, page 142:
      He tells me with great passion that she has bubbled him out of his youth; that she drilled him on to five and fifty [years old], and that he verily believes she will drop him in his old age, if she can find her account in another.
  3. (transitive, obsolete or dialectal) To cause to slip or waste away by degrees.
Translations

Etymology 5

Mandrillus leucophaeus

Probably of African origin; compare mandrill.

Noun

drill (plural drills)

  1. An Old World monkey of West Africa, Mandrillus leucophaeus, similar in appearance to the mandrill, but lacking the colorful face.
Translations

Further reading

Etymology 6

From German Drillich (“denim, canvas, drill”).

Noun

drill (countable and uncountable, plural drills)

  1. A strong, durable cotton fabric with a strong bias (diagonal) in the weave.
Synonyms
Derived terms
Translations

French

Etymology

From English drill.

Pronunciation

Noun

drill m (plural drills)

  1. drill (tool)

Related terms

Further reading

German

Pronunciation

Verb

drill

  1. singular imperative of drillen
  2. (colloquial) first-person singular present of drillen

Norwegian Bokmål

Verb

drill

  1. imperative of drille
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