Etymology

brail

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Today it means: A small rope used to truss up sails. Full definition →

Middle English brayle ← Old French braiel ← Medieval Latin bracale
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The story

  1. Medieval Latin · derived frombracale“girdle”
  2. Old French · derived frombraiel
  3. Middle English · inherited frombrayle
  4. English todaybrail

From Middle English brayle, from Old French braiel, from Medieval Latin bracale (“girdle”) (from bracae (“breeches”)).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.