trull
nounEtymology From French tous les trois (“all three”).
1
Card games, Games A set of three special trump cards used in some Tarock games, having a higher value than the other trumps.
trull
noun/tɹʌl/
Etymology From Middle English trul (“travel about”), from Old French troller, treiller (“to hunt”). Doublet of troll.
1
Archaic A female prostitute or harlot.
- Spayne then enamour'd with the Romane trull, / Calls all her forces, more then Atomies, / And tells Ill-fortunes ſtorie to the full; […]1595, Iruis [i.e., Gervase] Markham, The Most Honorable Tragedie of Sir Richard Grinuile, Knight, London: […] I. Roberts, for Richard Smith, →OCLC; republished in Edward Arber, editor, The Last Fight of the Revenge at Sea; under the Command of Vice-Admiral Sir Richard Grenville, on the 10–11th of September, 1591. Described by Sir Walter Raleigh, November, 1591. Gervase Markham, 1595. and Jan Huygen van ’Linschoten, in Dutch, 1596; English, 1598; and Latin, 1599 (English Reprints), Southgate, London: [Muir and Paterson, […]], 15 November 1871, →OCLC, page 55:
- ‘Hark'ee, child,’ says she, ‘is not that very young gentleman now in bed with some nasty trull or other?’1749, Henry Fielding, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC:
4 more examples
- South of Delhi, Sahib, you know the saying—‘Rats are the men and trulls the women.’1888, Rudyard Kipling, “Dray Wara Yow Dee”, in In Black and White (A. H. Wheeler & Co.’s Indian Railway Library; no. 3), 5th edition, Allahabad: Messrs. A. H. Wheeler & Co.; London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, & Rivington, Ld., […], published 1890, →OCLC:
- There was bad blood between them at first, says Mr Vincent, and the lord Harry called farmer Nicholas all the old Nicks in the world and an old whoremaster that kept seven trulls in his house and I'll meddle in his matters, says he.1922 February, James Joyce, Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC:
- However, terrible as it may seem to the tall maiden sisters of J.P.'s in Queen Anne houses with walled vegetable gardens, this courtesan, strumpet, harlot, whore, punk, fille de joie, street-walker, this trollop, this trull, this baggage, this hussy, this drab, skit, rig, quean, mopsy, demirep, demimondaine, this wanton, this fornicatress, this doxy, this concubine, this frail sister, this poor Queenie--did actually solicit me, did actually say 'coming home to-night, dearie' and my soul was not blasted enough to call a policeman.1936, Anthony Bertram, Like the Phoenix:
- A trull for certain, then; but a trull reformed, long since come up in the world.2002, Peter Tonkin, One Head Too Many: