pell-mell

• pell mell, pellmell

From French pêle-mêle, from Old French pesle-mesle, apparently a rhyme based on the stem of mesler (“to mix, meddle”). Compare meddle, melee.

• IPA^(key): /ˈpɛlˈmɛl/
• Homophone: pall mall (US)

• Audio (US):

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pell-mell (comparative more pell-mell, superlative most pell-mell)

1. Hasty and uncontrolled.
   • c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, ”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies  (First Folio), London: Isaac Iaggard, and Ed Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, , page 69, column 2:

     Nor moody Beggars, ſtaruing for a time / Of pell-mell hauocke, and confusion.

   • 1883, Transactions of the Edinburgh Geological Society, volume 4, page 204:

     These present the appearance of masses of water-worn gravel, mixed in the most pell mell confusion, the boulders being often of very large size; but I observed no striae, nor any of the blue tenacious clay of the Till, which it so much resembled.

   • 1924, Konrad Bercovici, Around the World in New York, page 134:

     The whole district presents the most pell-mell throwing together imaginable.

   • 1961, Charles J. Patterson, Letters relating to Africa south of the Sahara, especially to Nigeria, page 18:

     The pell mell, hell for leather traffic of Lagos was more pell mell, hell for leather than ever.

   • 2003, Audrey Joan Whitson, Teaching Places, page 50:

     The cattle are less disciplined, more pell-mell, heavy-footed, their hooves stamping the ground to mud in several places.

   • 2021 July 26, Steven Lee Myers, Keith Bradsher, Chris Buckley, “As China Boomed, It Didn’t Take Climate Change Into Account. Now It Must.”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN:

     China’s pell-mell, brisk urbanization has in some ways made the challenge harder to face.

pell-mell (not comparable)

1. In haste and chaos; uncontrolledly, confusedly.
   • , London: [James Roberts] for Nicholas Ling, published 1595, →OCLC, act V:

     But ſeeing that there the murdring Enemie, / Peſle-meſle, purſued them like a ſtorme of hayle, / They gan retyre vvhere Iuba vvas encampt; […]]

   • 1861, George Wilkes, The Great Battle, page 27:

     Never was there a great battle fought more pell-mell, since war began; never was valor so completely thrown away.

   • , [Mary Elizabeth Braddon], “‘The Breaker has come up before Them’”, in Ishmael: , volume I, London: John and Robert Maxwell, , →OCLC, page 289:

     The table was covered with a confusion of papers, books, pamphlets, all heaped upon one another pell-mell; […]

   • 1905, Charles Sanford Terry, The Young Pretender, page 81:

     Pell-mell they rushed for Inverness and safety, leaving the strange battlefield to the stalwart five.

   • 1913, Arthur Conan Doyle, “(please specify the page)”, in The Poison Belt , London; New York, N.Y.: Hodder and Stoughton, →OCLC:

     A group of the reapers whom we had seen running from the fields were lying all pell-mell, their bodies crossing each other, at the bottom of it.

   • 1996, Rodney Hall, The Island in the Mind, page 400:

     And the prompter our payments the more pell-mell the news came in and the more obligingly gruesome its detail.

   • 2006, Marion Woods, “Getting Ready”, in A Spiritual Journey Through Poetry with Marion Woods, published 2009, page 48:

     Some are already packed up well; / Others are at it, most pell mell.

pell-mell (uncountable)

1. Alternative form of pall mall (“ball game”)

• helter-skelter
• willy-nilly