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Etymology 1

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From Middle English broylen, brulen (to broil, cook), from Anglo-Norman bruiller, broiller (to broil, roast), Old French brusler, bruller (to broil, roast, char), a blend of two Old French verbs:

Verb

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broil (third-person singular simple present broils, present participle broiling, simple past and past participle broiled)

  1. (transitive, Canada, US, obsolete in the UK) To cook by direct, radiant heat.
    Synonym: (British) grill
    • 1788, Hannah Glasse, The Art of Cookery, Made Plain and Easy: Which Far Exceeds Any Thing of the Kind Yest Published[1], page 6:
      To broil a pigeon. When you broil them, do them in the same manner, and take care your fire is very clear, and set your gridiron high, that they may not burn, and have a little parsley and butter in a cup. You may split them, and broil them with a little pepper and salt, and you may roast them only with a little parsley and butter in a dish.
    • 1798, Richard Briggs, The English Art of Cookery…With Bills of Fare for Every Month in the Year…A New Edition[2], page 70:
      To broil Red Mullet. Neither seale nor gut your mullet, wipe them very clean in a cloth, butter half a sheet of writing paper for each fish, put them in, and fasten it all round; have a very clear fire, broil them very gently for twenty minutes, hen put them in a dish, with anchovy sauce and plain butter in boats.
    • 1813, Bell Plumptre, Domestic Management; Or, the Healthful Cookery-Book[3], page 247:
      To broil fish. To broil trout in a third way. When they are cleaned and washed, dry them well in a napkin. Then bind them about with packthread, sprinkle them with melted butter and salt, and broil them over a gentle fire, turning them from time to time.
  2. (transitive, Canada, US) To expose to great heat.
  3. (intransitive, Canada, US) To be exposed to great heat.
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Noun

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broil (plural broils)

  1. Food prepared by broiling.
    • 1863, J[oseph] Sheridan Le Fanu, “Concerning a Little Rehearsal in Captain Cluffe’s Lodging, and a Certain Confidence between Dr. Sturk and Mr. Dangerfield”, in The House by the Church-yard. [], volume II, London: Tinsley, Brothers, [], →OCLC, page 86:
      Cluffe, externally acquiescing, had yet made up his mind, if a decent opportunity presented, to be detected and made prisoner, and that the honest troubadours should sup on a hot broil, and sip some of the absent General's curious Madeira at the feet of their respective mistresses, with all the advantage which a situation so romantic and so private would offer.
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Etymology 2

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From Middle English broilen (to quarrel, present in disorder), from Anglo-Norman broiller (to mix up), from Vulgar Latin *brodiculāre (to jumble together) from *brodum (broth, stew), from Frankish *broþ (broth), from Proto-Germanic *bruþą (broth).

Alternative forms

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Verb

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broil (third-person singular simple present broils, present participle broiling, simple past and past participle broiled)

  1. (transitive) To cause a rowdy disturbance; embroil.
  2. (intransitive, obsolete) To brawl.

Noun

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broil (plural broils)

  1. (archaic) A brawl; a rowdy disturbance.
    come to broils
    • 1756, [Edmund Burke], A Vindication of Natural Society: Or, A View of the Miseries and Evils Arising to Mankind from Every Species of Artificial Society. [], London: [] M. Cooper [], →OCLC, page 32:
      But to give the faireſt Play to every ſide of the Queſtion, I vvill own that there is a Haughtineſs, and Fierceneſs in human Nature, vvhich vvill cauſe innumerable Broils, place Men in vvhat State you pleaſe; but ovvning this, I ſtill inſiſt in charging to Political Regulations, that theſe Broils are ſo frequent, ſo cruel, and attended vvith ſo deplorable Conſequences.
    • 1819 December 20 (indicated as 1820), Walter Scott, chapter XXVII, in Ivanhoe; a Romance. [], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: [] Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co. [], →OCLC:
      "Away with this prating dotard," said Front-de Boeuf, "lock him up in the chapel, to tell his beads till the broil be over. It will be a new thing to the saints in Torquilstone to hear aves and paters; they have not been so honoured, I trow, since they were cut out of stone."
    • a. 1822 (date written), John Keats, “[Tragedies.] Otho the Great: A Tragedy in Five Acts.”, in [Horace Elisha Scudder], editor, The Complete Poetical Works and Letters of John Keats, Cambridge edition, Boston, Mass., New York, N.Y.: Houghton, Mifflin and Company [], published 1899, →OCLC, Act I, (please specify the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals), page 159, column 1, lines 1-2:
      So, I am safe emerged from these broils! / Amid the wreck of thousands I am whole []
    • 1840, Robert Chambers, William Chambers, Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, volume 8, page 382:
      Since the provinces declared their independence, broils and squabblings of one sort and another have greatly retarded the advancement which they might otherwise have made.
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