Mill

How to spell mill

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce mill

What does mill mean?

1. nounA building fitted with machinery for grinding grain, or more broadly a factory that processes a particular material.
2. verbTo grind or process something in or as if in a mill, or to cut and shape metal with a machine.
3. verbTo move around in a confused or aimless mass, usually followed by about or around.

Mill in a sentence

• noun

  The old water mill on the river once ground flour for the whole village.

• verb

  The workshop can mill the steel block to the exact thickness required.

• verb

  Passengers began to mill about the platform while the train was delayed.

• noun

  His grandfather worked at the cotton mill for over thirty years.

• verb

  They still mill their own grain into flour using a small stone wheel.

• verb

  The crowd continued to mill around the entrance long after the doors closed.

Where does mill come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin mola, meaning a millstone or the device used for grinding grain, which itself came from molere, the verb 'to grind'. Late Latin formed molina from this, and that word travelled into Old English as mylen, denoting the building where grain was ground into flour. Over the centuries the English form shortened and settled as 'mill', and its meaning broadened well beyond flour: by the industrial era it covered any factory powered by water or steam, such as a cotton mill or a steel mill. The same molere root still echoes in 'molar', the grinding tooth at the back of the jaw. The spelling is mercifully simple, a short stem with a doubled final 'l', a pattern English favours after a single short vowel.

How the word is built

• mill (from Latin mola, a millstone or grinding device, via Old English mylen)