seel

Meanings

1. 1verbtransitivearchaicspecialist

   To stitch a young hawk's eyelids shut for a time as part of taming it for falconry.

   Grammar: Takes an object: seel a hawk.

   Patterns

   • seel a hawk

   Old manuals tell the falconer to seel a wild hawk for a few days.

   In earlier centuries a falconer would seel the bird's eyes with a fine thread.

   The practice of seeling hawks has long been abandoned.

2. 2verbtransitivearchaicliterary

   To close up or blind someone's eyes, usually in a figurative or poetic sense.

   Grammar: Literary use, often passive: eyes seeled by sleep.

   Patterns

   • seel someone's eyes

   The poet wrote that night would seel the eyes of the weary.

   Grief had seeled her mind to the warnings of her friends.

Word forms

Common combinations

seel a hawk

They used to seel a hawk to calm it.

seel the eyes

Sleep came to seel the eyes of the child.

seeled eyes

The seeled eyes of the young falcon were stitched with silk.

Synonyms and how they differ

blind

Blind is the modern word for taking away sight, while seel is an old term for stitching a bird's eyes shut.

close

Close is a simple modern word for shutting eyes, but seel implies sewing or sealing them.

hoodwink

Hoodwink means to deceive and once meant to cover the eyes, while seel was about stitching a hawk's eyelids.

Word family

seeling noun

the act of seeling a bird, a historical term

Commonly confused: seel or seal? seel or ceil?

Practice

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