Main entry: Spill
Verb
Pronunciation and accent: spIl
Etymology: from Old English spillan.
Preterite tense: spilled (spIld) or spilt (spIlt)
Preterite participle: spilled (spIld) or spilt (spIlt).
present participle: spilling.
Obsolete and pristine uses:
Transitively a. to kill. b. To ruin (a person). c. To destroy (something). d. To deprive of something. e. To damage; to render useless. f. To expend wastefully; to spend unprofitably. Intransitively: a. To perish or to be lost. b. To degenerate; to diminish in value.
Modern uses:
Transitively
First definition: to cause (blood) to flow out of the body by wounding
Synonyms: to shed, effund
Robert drew a relieving breath. He was grateful that the rescue had been accomplished without spilling the blood of the robber or his own.
Caroline Hentz (Robert Graham)
[…] for one spoonful of blood I draw, you spill a tubful
Charles Reade (The cloister and the hearth)
[…] there was no blood spilled but mine own!
Walter Scott (The Monastery)
Courcy answered very forwardly […] that he would never fight for him, neither for any such as he was; that he was not worthy to have one drop of blood spilled for him.
James Stuart (Historical Memoirs…)
Second definition: to fail to keep (a liquid or a substance whose particles are small and loose, as sugar) within the receptacle; this is, to lose or waste by permitting or causing to fall or issue from the vessel
Spill differs from pour in the connotation of accidental loss.
It may be approximately translated by derramar, in Spanish; rovesciare, in Italian; repandre, in French.
Antonym: to contain
[…] the sea was so quiet, that we could read, write, or walk the deck with perfect safety and convenience, and not a glass was overturned, or a drop of wine spilled upon the table.
Benjamin Silliman (A journal of travels in England…)
[…] he suddenly raised his head, seized his wicked bottle, poured more of its contents into the glass -though spilling much as he did so -and drank it off at one deep draught.
Eliza Meteyard (Lilian’s golden hours)
The bottle dropped from her hand, and smashed to pieces on the floor, spilling the contents; but this mishap the hag was too far gone to notice.
Forester Fitz-David (Alice Littleton)
Alcohol is more expansible than water, but on account of its combustibility, care should be taken that none of it is spilled into the fire.
Benjamin Silliman (Elements of chemistry)
Third definition: extensively: to fail to keep (a collection of things) together within the receptacle; to scatter
[…] they went down together and rolled across the floor. The legs of a desk crashed and a litter of writing materials was spilled over them.
Rex Beach (Flowing Gold)
The trunk had been packed full of papers —deeds, letters, bills, etc., which had been tied up in separate bundles, but [… in consequence of] the force of the fall, they now lay in confused heaps and irretrievably mixed, as far as Maria was concerned.
She sat down upon the floor and began to gather them up, restoring them in as orderly a manner as possible to the trunk. Among other things she came upon a box which had slid a little to one side of the heap. This, also, had burst open, and its contents were partially spilled out.
Georgie Sheldon (The Heatherford Fortune)
Fourth definition: webster dict.: to relieve (a sail) from the pressure of the wind, so that it can be more easily reefed or furled, or to avoid capsizing.
Fifth definition: slang: to cause to fall from a vehicle
Sixth definition: slang: to let become known; to utter
Intransitively
(Of a liquid or a substance whose particles are small and loose, as sugar) to issue or fall from the receptacle (vessel, etc.), having failed someone or the receptacle itself in keeping within; to be lost or wasted, having accidentally fell or issued from a receptacle, or having improperly been poured; to flow over the brim
After politely offering the first drink to Dora, then to Butch, Mary gulped […] three dippers of the cold spring water, drinking so quickly that some of the water spilled over her lips and onto the front of her dress.
Lee Nelson (Cassidy)
[…] I took a bottle of milk and with all my force struck at [… the handle of the door]. The only result was that the bottle broke and the milk spilled over my legs, and trickled into my boots.
Maxim Gorky (My childhood)
She was silent. He went to the kitchen. The fawn wobbled after him. A pan of morning's milk stood in the kitchen safe. The cream had risen on it. He skimmed the cream into a jug and used his shirt sleeve to wipe up the few drops he could not keep from spilling. If he could keep the fawn from being any trouble to his mother, she would mind it less. He poured milk into a small gourd. He held it out to the fawn. It butted it suddenly, smelling the milk. He saved it precariously from spilling over the floor. He led the fawn outside to the yard and began again.
Marjorie Rawlings (The Yearling)
