woodwall Now dial.
(ˈwʊdwɒl)
Forms: 3 wude-, 3–5 wodewale, 5 -woll, wodwale, 6 wode-, woodw(h)ale, -waule, -weele, 7 -wal, woodhall, 6– woodwall. See also Eng. Dial. Dict.
[ME. wodewale, ad. or cogn. w. MLG. wedewale (early Flem. widewael ‘oriolus’) f. wede wood n.1 + *wale of obscure origin. (Cf. witwall, and, for sense 2, hickwall.)]
† 1. A singing bird: in early quots. of uncertain identity, but prob. (as later) the Golden Oriole, Oriolus galbula, which has a loud flute-like whistle: = witwall 1. Obs.
| a 1250 Owl & Night. 1659 (Cott. MS.) Þrusche & þrostle & wudewale [Jesus MS. wodewale] An fuheles boþe grete & smale. a 1310 in Wright Lyric P. v. 26 The wilde laveroc ant wolc ant the wodewale. c 1325 Gloss. W. de Bibbesw. in Wright Voc. 166 Escoter la note de l'oriol [gloss a wodewale]. ? a 1366 Chaucer Rom. Rose 658 In many places were nyghtyngales, Alpes, fynches, and wodewales, That in her swete song deliten. Ibid. 914 With popyniay, with nyghtyngale, With Chalaundre, and with wodewale. c 1430 Lydg. Min. Poems (Percy Soc.) 23 On fresh braunches syngith the wodwale. a 1600 Robin Hood ii. in Child Ballads III. 91 The woodweele sang, and wold not cease, Amongst the leaues a lyne. a 1650 Eger & Grine 922 in Furniv. & Hales Percy Folio I. 383 The throstlecocke, the Nightingale, The laueracke & the wild woodhall. 1657 Tomlinson Renou's Disp. 24 That Bird which Holerius calls Galbula, that is Woodwall. a 1667 Skinner Etymol. Ling. Angl. (1671), Witwall vel Woodwall,..galbula. |
2. A woodpecker; esp. the Green Woodpecker, Gecinus viridis: = witwall 2.
In quot. 1489 tr. OF. bruhier buzzard.
| c 1489 Caxton Blanchardyn xliv. 173 But men saye in a comyn langage that ‘neuer noo wodewoll dyde brede a sperhawke’. 1555 Eden Decades (Arb.) 224 Byrdes..sumewhat lyke vnto those which we caule woodwaules, or woodpeckes. 1566 Act 8 Eliz. c. 15 §2 For the Head of everie Woodwall Pye Jaye Raven or Kyte, one peny. 1815 Shaw's Gen. Zool. IX. 185 [The Green Woodpecker] is called in different parts of England by the various names of Woodspite,..Woodwall, and Poppinjay. 1916 J. R. Harris in Contemp. Rev. Feb. 212 In Devonshire a common name for the bird is Woodall. |