Etymology

noil

N1O1I1L1

Today it means: A short fibre left over from combing wool or spinning silk during the preparation of textile yarns. Full definition →

Middle English *noyel ← Old French noiel ← Early Medieval Latin nōdellus
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The story

  1. Late Latin · derived fromnucālis“nut-like”
  2. Early Medieval Latin · derived fromnōdellus“buckle”
  3. Old French · derived fromnoiel
  4. Middle English · inherited from*noyel
  5. English todaynoil

Inherited from Middle English *noyel, from Old French noiel, variant of noel, from either Early Medieval Latin nōdellus (“buckle”, diminutive of nōdus "knot") or Late Latin nucālis (“nut-like”, derivative of nux "nut"). Doublet of newel and noyau.

Words from the same roots

Early Medieval Latinnōdellus all →

newelnoyau

Late Latinnucālis all →

newelnoyau

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.