Travail

Pronunciation

• enPR: trəˈvāl, IPA: /tɹəˈveɪl/
• Rhymes: -eɪl

Origin

From Old French travail ("suffering, torment").

Full definition of travail

Noun

1. (archaic) Arduous or painful exertion; excessive labor, suffering, hardship. from 13th c.
• HookerAs everything of price, so this doth require travail.
• 1603, John Florio, translating Michel de Montaigne, Essays, II.20:Travell and pleasure, most unlike in nature, are notwithstanding followed together by a kind of I wot not what natural conjunction ....
• 1936, Djuna Barnes, Nightwood, Faber & Faber 2007, p. 38:He had thought of making a destiny for himself, through laborious and untiring travail.
2. Specifically, the labor of childbirth. from 13th c.
3. (obsolete, countable) An act of working; labor US, labour British. 14th-18th c.
4. (obsolete) The eclipse of a celestial object. 17th c.
5. Obsolete form of travel

Verb

1. To toil.
• Latimerslothful persons which will not travail for their livings
2. To go through the labor of childbirth.
• 1526, William Tyndale, trans. Bible, John XIV:A woman when she traveyleth hath sorowe, be cause her houre is come: but as sone as she is delivered off her chylde she remembreth no moare her anguysshe, for ioye that a man is borne in to the worlde.