# gaol

Pronunciation: say "JAYL" /d͡ʒeɪ(ə)l/

## Noun

1. A place where people are lawfully held in custody against their will; a prison.
   - Simple: A place where people are kept locked up by law, for example after a crime or before a trial.
   - _The new gaol was built outside the city walls, with separate wings for men and women._
   - _The Victorian county gaol has been turned into a museum and a hotel._
2. The state of being locked up in prison.
   - Simple: Being kept locked up in prison.
   - _The magistrate warned him that he faced gaol if he offended again._
   - _Gaol would mean losing the business she had spent twenty years building._

## Verb

3. To send someone to prison or have them locked up there.
   - Simple: To put someone in prison.
   - _The regime continues to gaol its critics without a fair trial._
   - _He was gaoled for life for the murder of a shopkeeper._

## Origin

Middle English spelt it in several ways, among them gayole and gayle, and took it from Old French gaiole. Behind that is Medieval Latin gabiola, standing for Late Latin caveola, a small form of Latin cavea, which meant a hollow, a coop or a cage. Compare the word cage.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/gaol (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).