poll

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   convert into a pollard

   pollard trees

2. 2
   noun

   A formal vote held in order to ascertain the most popular choice.

   The student council had a poll to see what people want served in the cafeteria.

3. 3
   noun

   A polling place (usually as plural, polling places)

   The polls close at 8 p.m.

4. 4
   noun

   The head, particularly the scalp or pate upon which hair (normally) grows.

   […]the doctor, as if to hear better, had taken off his powdered wig, and sat there, looking very strange indeed with his own close-cropped black poll.

5. 5
   noun

   A mass of people, a mob or muster, considered as a head count.

   We are the greater poll, and in true fear They gave us our demands.

6. 6
   verb

   To vote at an election.

   Mr. Millbank's friends were not disheartened, as it was known that the leading members of Mr. Rigby's Committee had polled; whereas his opponent's were principally reserved.

7. 7
   verb

   To register or deposit, as a vote; to elicit or call forth, as votes or voters.

   He polled a hundred votes more than his opponent.

8. 8
   verb

   To cut off; to remove by clipping, shearing, etc.; to mow or crop.

   to poll the hair; to poll wool; to poll grass

Etymology

From Middle English pol, polle ("scalp, pate"), from or cognate with Middle Dutch pol, pōle, polle (“top, summit; head”), from Proto-West Germanic *poll, from Proto-Germanic *pullaz (“round object, head, top”), from Proto-Indo-European *bolno-, *bōwl- (“orb, round object, bubble”), from Proto-Indo-European *bew- (“to blow, swell”). Akin to Scots pow (“head, crown, scalp, skull”), Saterland Frisian pol (“round, full, brimming”, adjective), German Low German Polle, Poll (“round object, ball”), German Low German Poller (“head, tree-top, bulb”), Danish puld (“crown of a hat”), Swedish dialectal pu…