trolley
English edit
Alternative forms edit
Etymology edit
Early 19th century (1823) meaning "cart", of dialectal origin (Suffolk), probably from troll (“to trundle, roll”) + -ey (diminutive ending).
Pronunciation edit
Noun edit
trolley (plural trolleys or trollies)
- A trolley pole; a single-pole device for collecting electrical current from an overhead electrical line, normally for a tram/streetcar or a trolleybus.
- (US) A streetcar or light train.
- Synonyms: (UK) tram, trolley car
- 1946, George Johnston, Skyscrapers in the Mist, page 107:
- Gremlinesque behaviour might not be very obvious to an America, who would accept as perfectly natural the quaintly pixilated sayings and doings that are happening in subways, in trolleys, on buses, in bars at all times of the day and night.
- (US, colloquial) A light rail, tramway, trolleybus or streetcar system.
- A truck from which the load is suspended in some kinds of cranes.
- Synonyms: crane trolley, traveling trolley
- A truck which travels along the fixed conductors in an electric railway, and forms a means of connection between them and a railway car.
- (Australia, New Zealand, British, Ireland) A cart or shopping cart; a shopping trolley.
- 2013 March 15, “The Shopping Trolley” (track 10), in Horsing Around[1], performed by Richie Kavanagh:
- About a shopping trolley, I thought I'd let ye know. Ya'd try to push it straight but it never seems ta go. Ya'd wobble through the car park, hopping off the cars. Anyone would think ya had a few auld jars.
- Clipping of flatbed trolley.
- (British) A hand truck.
- (British) A soapbox car.
- (British) A gurney, a stretcher with wheeled legs.
- (Philippines) A handcar.
Hyponyms edit
- (streetcar): interurban
Derived terms edit
Descendants edit
Translations edit
Verb edit
trolley (third-person singular simple present trolleys, present participle trolleying, simple past and past participle trolleyed or trollied)
- To bring to by trolley.
- To use a trolley vehicle to go from one place to another.
- To travel by trolley (streetcar, trolleybus or light train).
French edit
Etymology edit
Borrowed from English trolley.
Pronunciation edit
Noun edit
trolley m (plural trolleys)
- (anglicism) trolley pole
- (anglicism) trolleybus
Descendants edit
- → Romanian: troleu
Further reading edit
- “trolley”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.
Spanish edit
Etymology edit
Unadapted borrowing from English trolley.
Pronunciation edit
Noun edit
trolley m (plural trolleys or trolley)
- (anglicism) Alternative spelling of trole
Usage notes edit
According to Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) prescriptions, unadapted foreign words should be written in italics in a text printed in roman type, and vice versa, and in quotation marks in a manuscript text or when italics are not available. In practice, this RAE prescription is not always followed.