different between shill vs shell

English

Etymology

Unknown; attested as verb 1914, as noun 1916. Perhaps an abbreviation of shillaber, attested 1913. The word entered English via carny, originally denoting a carnival worker who pretends to be a member of the audience in an attempt to elicit interest in an attraction.

Speculatively an extended form of German Schieber (“black marketeer, profiteer”) via *shi-la-ber.

There are some suggestions that it originates in the surname Shilaber or Shillibeer, especially George Shillibeer, but proposed origins are dubious as the word is first attested in North America in the 20th century, while proposed models are 19th century British.

American humorist Benjamin Penhallow Shillaber (1814–1890) was known to write under the name Mrs. Ruth Partington to lend credibility to some of his ideas. This is one more possible origin of the word, although there is no specific evidence supporting a connection.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??l/
• Rhymes: -?l

Noun

shill (plural shills)

1. A person paid to endorse a product favourably, while pretending to be impartial.
   • 1983, Robert Anton Wilson, Prometheus Rising,

     Witnesses have testified that Jim Jones (like a few other professional faith-healers) used shills part of the time....

2. An accomplice at a confidence trick during an auction or gambling game.
   • 1994, Cormac McCarthy, The Crossing,

     The pitchman swept his cane in a slow acceleration over the heads of the crowd and then suddenly pointed the silver cap toward Billy and the shill.

3. (gambling) A house player in a casino.

Synonyms

• shillaber

Translations

Verb

shill (third-person singular simple present shills, present participle shilling, simple past and past participle shilled)

1. (derogatory) To promote or endorse in return for payment, especially dishonestly.
   • 1996, Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World,

     Today there are even commercials in which real scientists, some of considerable distinction, shill for corporations. They teach that scientists too will lie for money. As Tom Paine warned, inuring us to lies lays the groundwork for many other evils.

2. To put under cover; to sheal.
3. (Britain, obsolete, dialect) To shell.

Related terms

• sheep-dip

Translations

References

Anagrams

• Hills, hills

English

Etymology

From Middle English schelle, from Old English s?iell, from Proto-West Germanic *skallju, from Proto-Germanic *skalj?, from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kelH- (“to split, cleave”).

Compare West Frisian skyl (“peel, rind”), Dutch schil (“peel, skin, rink”), Low German Schell (“shell, scale”), Irish scelec (“pebble”), Latin silex (“pebble, flint”), siliqua (“pod”), Old Church Slavonic ??????? (skolika, “shell”). More at shale.Doublet of sheal.

• (computing): From being viewed as an outer layer of interface between the user and the operating-system internals.

Pronunciation

• enPR: sh?l, IPA^(key): /??l/
• Rhymes: -?l

Noun

shell (plural shells)

1. A hard external covering of an animal.
   1. The calcareous or chitinous external covering of mollusks, crustaceans, and some other invertebrates.

   2. (by extension) Any mollusk having such a covering.
   3. (entomology) The exoskeleton or wing covers of certain insects.
   4. The conjoined scutes that constitute the "shell" (carapace) of a tortoise or turtle.
   5. The overlapping hard plates comprising the armor covering the armadillo's body.
2. The hard calcareous covering of a bird egg.
3. One of the outer layers of skin of an onion.

4. (botany) The hard external covering of various plant seed forms.
   1. The covering, or outside part, of a nut.

   2. A pod containing the seeds of certain plants, such as the legume Phaseolus vulgaris.
   3. (in the plural) Husks of cacao seeds, a decoction of which is sometimes used as a substitute or adulterant for cocoa and its products such as chocolate.
5. (geology) The accreted mineral formed around a hollow geode.
6. (weaponry) The casing of a self-contained single-unit artillery projectile.
7. (weaponry) A hollow, usually spherical or cylindrical projectile fired from a siege mortar or a smoothbore cannon. It contains an explosive substance designed to be ignited by a fuse or by percussion at the target site so that it will burst and scatter at high velocity its contents and fragments. Formerly called a bomb.
8. (weaponry) The cartridge of a breechloading firearm; a load; a bullet; a round.
9. (architecture) Any slight hollow structure; a framework, or exterior structure, regarded as not complete or filled in, as the shell of a house.
10. A garment, usually worn by women, such as a shirt, blouse, or top, with short sleeves or no sleeves, that often fastens in the rear.
11. A coarse or flimsy coffin; a thin interior coffin enclosed within a more substantial one.

    (Can we find and add a quotation of Knight to this entry?)

12. (music) A string instrument, as a lyre, whose acoustical chamber is formed like a shell.
    • 1687, John Dryden, A Song for Cecilia's Day

13. (music) The body of a drum; the often wooden, often cylindrical acoustic chamber, with or without rims added for tuning and for attaching the drum head.
14. An engraved copper roller used in print works.
15. The thin coating of copper on an electrotype.
16. (nautical) The watertight outer covering of the hull of a vessel, often made with planking or metal plating.
17. (nautical, rigging) The outer frame or case of a block within which the sheaves revolve.
18. (nautical) A light boat whose frame is covered with thin wood, impermeable fabric, or water-proofed paper; a racing shell or dragon boat.
19. (chemistry) A set of atomic orbitals that have the same principal quantum number.
20. (figuratively) The outward form independent of what is inside.
21. (figuratively) The empty outward form of someone or something.

22. An emaciated person.

23. A psychological barrier to social interaction.

24. (computing) An operating system software user interface, whose primary purpose is to launch other programs and control their interactions; the user's command interpreter. Shell is a way to separate the internal complexity of the implementation of the command from the user. The internals can change while the user experience/interface remains the same.

25. (business) A legal entity that has no operations.

26. A concave rough cast-iron tool in which a convex lens is ground to shape.
27. (engineering) A gouge bit or shell bit.
28. (phonology) The onset and coda of a syllable.
29. (Britain, slang) A person's ear.

    Synonym: shell-like

    Can I have a quick word in your shell?

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

shell (third-person singular simple present shells, present participle shelling, simple past and past participle shelled)

1. To remove the outer covering or shell of something.
2. To bombard, to fire projectiles at, especially with artillery.
3. (informal) To disburse or give up money, to pay. (Often used with out).
4. (intransitive) To fall off, as a shell, crust, etc.
5. (intransitive) To cast the shell, or exterior covering; to fall out of the pod or husk.

   Nuts shell in falling.

   Wheat or rye shells in reaping.

6. (computing, intransitive) To switch to a shell or command line.
   • 1993, Robin Nixon, The PC Companion (page 115)

     Automenu is a good program to try, and offers a fair amount of protection - but, unfortunately, it's one of those systems that allow users to shell to DOS.

7. To form shallow, irregular cracks (in a coating).
8. (topology) To form a shelling.

Derived terms

• sheller
• shell out

Translations

Further reading

• shell in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• shell in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• shell on Wikimedia Commons.Wikimedia Commons

Anagrams

• hells

Yola

Etymology

From Middle English schal, from Old English s?eal.

Verb

shell

1. shall

References

• Jacob Poole (1867) , William Barnes, editor, A glossary, with some pieces of verse, of the old dialect of the English colony in the baronies of Forth and Bargy, County of Wexford, Ireland, J. Russell Smith, ?ISBN