gull1
/ɡʌl
/noun
A long-winged web-footed seabird with a raucous call, typically having white plumage with a grey or black mantle.
- Family Laridae: several genera, in particular Larus, and numerous species.
- Carrion crows, large gulls, hawks and herons all receive severe punishment.
- Seabirds such as gulls and terns, even pelicans, can point the way to ‘sure thing’ action when the excited flocks are low and tight, dipping and circling.
Origin
Late Middle English: of Celtic origin; related to Welsh gwylan and Breton gwelan.
Rhymes
gull2
/ɡʌl/verb [with object]
Fool or deceive (someone): he had been gulled into believing that the documents were authentic...
- That's because the man that gulled him has a very, very long line of creditors.
- To understand ground rents and land prices is to understand cities; not to understand is to remain mired forever in confusion and fallacy, to be gulled and misled and bamboozled, which is, indeed and alas, the common lot of mankind.
- They are gulled by the oldest trick of all, the one that gets the victim to look somewhere else.
noun
A person who is fooled or deceived.The title of this piece might seem to be no more than a comment on the ease with which the flats, mugs, suckers, punters, marks, gulls, or coneys could be relieved of their money....
- Dauphine echoes the initial warning of the second prologue in describing the ways in which the gulls are duped.
Origin
Late 16th century: of unknown origin.