caul

• call [16th–17th c.]
• cawl

From Middle English, from Middle French and Old French cale (“head covering”), from Late Latin calautica.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /kɔːl/
• Rhymes: -ɔːl
• Homophone: call

caul (plural cauls)

1. (historical) A style of close-fitting circular cap worn by women in the sixteenth century and later, often made of linen. [from 14th c.]
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto VII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, OCLC 960102938:

     Ne spared they to strip her naked all. / Then when they had despoild her tire and call, / Such as she was, their eyes might her behold […]

2. (Britain, historical, often capitalized, used on maps) An entry to a mill lead taken from a burn or stream (a mill lead (or mill waterway) is generally smaller than a canal but moves a large volume of water). [chiefly 1800-1950]
3. (anatomy, obsolete except in specific senses) A membrane. [14th–17th c.]
4. The thin membrane which covers the lower intestines; the omentum. [from 14th c.]
5. The amnion which encloses the foetus before birth, especially that part of it which sometimes shrouds a baby’s head at birth (traditionally considered to be good luck). [from 16th c.]
   • 1849 May – 1850 November, Charles Dickens, The Personal History of David Copperfield, London: Bradbury & Evans, […], published 1850, OCLC 558196156:

     I was born with a caul, which was advertised for sale, in the newspapers, at the low price of fifteen guineas.

   • 1971, Keith Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic, Folio Society (2012), page 182:

     Even in the mid seventeenth century a country gentleman might regard his caul as a treasure to be preserved with great care, and bequeathed to his descendants.

6. The surface of a press that makes contact with panel product, especially a removable plate or sheet.
7. (woodworking) A strip or block of wood used to distribute or direct clamping force.
8. (cooking) Caul fat.

• ACLU, LUCA, Luca, UCLA

From Latin caulis.

caul

1. cabbage

caul

1. Alternative form of caule

• 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, London: J. Russell Smith, page 29