maul

[mawl] /mɔl/
noun
1.
a heavy hammer, as for driving stakes or wedges.
2.
Archaic. a heavy club or mace.
verb (used with object)
3.
to handle or use roughly:
The book was badly mauled by its borrowers.
4.
to injure by a rough beating, shoving, or the like; bruise:
to be mauled by an angry crowd.
5.
to split with a maul and wedge, as a wooden rail.
Also, mall.
Origin
1200-50; (noun) Middle English malle < Old French mail mallet, hammer < Latin malleus hammer; (v.) Middle English mallen < Old French maillier, derivative of noun
Related forms
mauler, noun
unmauled, adjective
Can be confused
mall, maul, maw.
Examples from the web for maul
  • They look cute, except for the part where they maul me and put big slobbery pools of drool all over me.
  • Then an extra chain, a splitting maul and two new round files.
  • He escaped only by pulling a wad of dollars out of his sock and throwing it in the air, and then driving off in the ensuing maul.
  • maul said he doesn't think it affected travel as much this year as was anticipated.
British Dictionary definitions for maul

maul

/mɔːl/
verb (transitive)
1.
to handle clumsily; paw
2.
to batter or lacerate
noun
3.
a heavy two-handed hammer suitable for driving piles, wedges, etc
4.
(rugby) a loose scrum that forms around a player who is holding the ball and on his feet
Derived Forms
mauler, noun
Word Origin
C13: from Old French mail, from Latin malleus hammer. See mallet
Word Origin and History for maul
v.

mid-13c., meallen "strike with a heavy weapon," from Middle English mealle (mid-13c.) "mace, wooden club, heavy hammer" (see maul (n.). The meaning "damage seriously, mangle" is first recorded 1690s. Related: Mauled; mauling.

n.

c.1200, mealle, "hammer, usually a heavy one; sledgehammer," from Old French mail "hammer," from Latin malleus "hammer" (see mallet).

maul in the Bible

an old name for a mallet, the rendering of the Hebrew mephits (Prov. 25:18), properly a war-club.