sill

Meanings

1. A breast wall; window breast; horizontal brink which forms the base of a window.
2. A threshold; horizontal structural member of a building near ground level on a foundation or pilings, or lying on the ground, and bearing the upright portion of a frame; a sill plate.
3. A stratum of rock, especially an intrusive layer of igneous rock lying parallel to surrounding strata.
4. A threshold or brink across the bottom of a canal lock for the gates to shut against.
5. A raised area at the base of the nasal aperture in the skull.
6. The inner edge of the bottom of an embrasure.

1. A young herring.

1. The shaft or thill of a carriage.

1. Silly.

1. A surname.

Etymology

From Middle English sille, selle, sülle, from Old English syll, syl (“sill, threshold, foundation, base, basis”), from Proto-Germanic *sulī (“bar, sill”), from Proto-Indo-European *sel-, *swel- (“beam, board, frame, threshold”). Cognate with Scots sil, sill (“balk, beam, floor, sill”), Dutch zulle (“sill”), Low German Sull, Sülle (“threshold, ramp, sill”), German Süll, Sülle (“threshold, sill”), Danish syld (“base of a framework building”), Swedish syll (“joist, cross-tie”), Norwegian syll, Icelandic syll, sylla (“sill”). Related also to German Schwelle ( > Danish svelle), Old Norse svill, Latin silva (“wood, forest”), Ancient Greek ὕλη (húlē).