Travail

Quick meaning: Travail is a noun meaning (literary) Arduous or painful exertion; excessive labor, suffering, hardship.

Meaning

(literary) Arduous or painful exertion; excessive labor, suffering, hardship.

More Meanings

1. Specifically, the labor of childbirth.
2. To toil.
3. To go through the labor of childbirth.
4. Obsolete form of travel.
5. Alternative form of travois (“a kind of sled”)
6. (obsolete, countable) An act of working; labor (US), labour (British).
7. (obsolete) The eclipse of a celestial object.

Example Sentences

But as every thing of price, so this doth require travail.

He had thought of making a destiny for himself, through laborious and untiring travail.

Travell and pleasure, most unlike in nature, are notwithstanding followed together by a kind of I wot not what natural conjunction[…].

But I know that to-day there are great questions calling for an answer, wrongs clamoring to be righted, a people in travail that pleads for ease!

Word Forms

• travails
• travaux
• travel
• travell
• travailing
• travailed

Synonyms for travail

Depending on context, synonyms include toil, tribulation, ordeal, exertion, grind, effort.

Antonyms for travail

Common opposites include ease, leisure.

Related Words

Related dictionary entries include toil, moil, labour, effort, exertion, drudge.

Related Dictionary Tools