-meal meaning (rare): definition, etymology

-meal

suffix

/miːl/

Etymology From Middle English -mele, from Old English -mǣlum (“at times”), from Proto-Germanic *mēlamiz, instrumental case of Proto-Germanic *mēlą (“measure; time”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian -moal, Dutch -maal, German Low German -maal, German -mal. More at meal.

Idiomatic, Morpheme, Rare Used to denote a fixed number, measure, or amount at a time.

wordmeal (“one word at a time, word by word”)

Derived terms: bitmeal, dropmeal, flockmeal, footmeal, heapmeal, inchmeal, leafmeal, littlemeal, pagemeal, piecemeal, stepmeal, stoundmeal, thousandmeal, whilemeal, wordmeal

-meal

suffix

Etymology From Middle English mele, from Old English melu (“meal, flour”), from Proto-Germanic *melwą (“meal, flour”), from Proto-Indo-European *melh₂- (“to grind, mill”). More at meal.

Morpheme Denotes a powder made of ground cereal.

Derived terms: bonemeal, cornmeal, oatmeal, peasemeal