toll Hear it!

toll¹ Definition

toll (tōl)

noun

  1. a tax or charge for a privilege, esp. for permission to pass over a bridge, along a highway, etc.
  2. a charge for service or extra service, as for transportation, for a long-distance telephone call, or, formerly, for having one's grain milled
  3. the number lost, taken, exacted, etc.; exaction the tornado took a heavy toll of lives

Etymology: ME < OE, akin to Ger zoll, ON tollr < MLowG tol < ML tolneum < VL *toloneum, toll(house), for L teloneum < Gr telōnion < telōnēs, tax collector < telos, tax, akin to tlēnai, to support, bear: for IE base see tolerate

intransitive verb

Now Rare to collect a toll or tolls

transitive verb

  1. to take or gather as a toll
  2. to impose a toll on

toll² Definition

toll (tōl)

transitive verb

  1. Now Chiefly Dial. to allure or entice; esp., to decoy (game, etc.)
    1. to ring (a church bell, etc.) slowly with regularly repeated strokes, esp. for announcing a death
    2. to sound (the hour, a knell, etc.) by this
    3. to announce, summon, or dismiss by this
    4. to announce the death of (someone) in this way

Etymology: ME tollen, to pull, ? akin to OE -tyllan, to mislead < IE base *del- > tale

intransitive verb

to sound or ring slowly in regularly repeated strokes: said of a bell

noun

  1. the act of tolling a bell
  2. the sound of a bell tolling
  3. a single stroke of the bell

toll² Related Forms

toll′er noun

toll Synonyms

toll

n.

  1. Charges

    duty, fee, customs, exaction, tollage; see also price.

  2. Loss

    casualties, deaths, losses; see damage 2.

toll Synonyms

toll

v.

knell, strike, ring, sound, peal; see also ring 3.

toll Law Definition

v

  1. To bar, or take away; to defeat.
  2. To stop from running (said of a statutory period of time).
  3. To charge for the use of another’s property, hence toll roads, toll bridges, and so on.

toll Usage Examples

Object

bell: As long as man still tolls the bell May life be well and fruitful.

Converse of object

  • levy: This information can then be used to levy tolls.
  • scrap: Significantly, a number of Labor backbenchers were in favor of scrapping the tolls on both bridges, against Executive policy.

Adjective modifier

  • heavy: The last hundred years had taken a heavy toll.
  • grim: With this population distribution, increasing human numbers and mounting development pressures are taking a grim toll on coastal and near-shore resources.
  • civilian: More than 3,500 Iraqis were killed last month, the highest civilian monthly toll since the war began.
  • appalling: And so my own sense is that sanctions, even the " smartest " sanctions, will continue to exact an appalling human toll.

Modifies a noun

  • booth: You should show your badge at the toll booth.
  • plaza: Microwave technology can now toll motorways at high speed, without the need for toll plazas.
  • motorway: Monitoring efforts on toll motorways have been pushed for similar reasons.
  • road: You can select to route using toll roads or avoiding them.
  • gate: In the summer time, parking fees apply at a toll gate, during the off peak season tickets are issued from the cafe.
  • bridge: A toll bridge across the River Trent at Walton was erected in 1834 at a cost of £ 7000.

Noun used with modifier

  • death: At the time of writing, the death toll from the assault on the city remains unknown.
  • motorway: Motorway tolls from Calais to La Tania are approximately £ 95 return.
  • bell: At the site of each house there is a stone outline, and a short bell tower, whose bell tolls every two minutes.
  • casualty: After the scandal of the needlessly high casualty toll of the Crimean War ( 1854-56 ), an assumption had taken firm hold.

Preposition: of

bell: An hour's tolling of a bell would only bring a hundred people to a sermon.