Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. South African A rural village, typically consisting of huts surrounded by a stockade.
- n. South African An enclosure for livestock.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. In South Africa, primarily, a collection of huts arranged around a circular inclosure for cattle, or the inclosure itself; hence, any closely built village, especially one within a stockade, or a farming establishment or ranch. Also spelled krawl.
- To place (cattle or sheep) in a kraal or shed for shelter or safe-keeping. See kraal, n.
Wiktionary
- n. In Central and Southern Africa, a rural village of huts surrounded by a stockade.
- n. An enclosure for livestock.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. South Africa A collection of huts within a stockade; a village; sometimes, a single hut.
- n. Ceylon An inclosure into which are driven wild elephants which are to be tamed and educated.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a pen for livestock in southern Africa
- n. a village of huts for native Africans in southern Africa; usually surrounded by a stockade
Etymologies
- From colonial Dutch kraal, from Portuguese curral. (Wiktionary)
- Afrikaans, from Portuguese curral, pen, perhaps from Vulgar Latin *currāle, enclosure for carts; see corral. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“The kraal, which is divided into 50 camps, is on the commonage about one kilometre outside Parys.”
“Lukwazi, his kraal was the one on the top of the second ridge beyond the Ghoda.”
“The town is built in a valley, with the exception of Wambe's own kraal, that is situated at the mouth of some caves upon the slope of the opposing mountains, over which I hoped to see our impi's spears flashing in the morrow's light.”
“He then went at once and borrowed a waggon and twelve oxen, and during the night we packed the waggon three times, and took three loads across the Buffalo River to Degaza's kraal, which is on Natal ground, forty sacks of grain, 200 pounds in a box, with clothes and other things, also mats and skins, and four head of cattle and a horse.”
Cetywayo and his White Neighbours Remarks on Recent Events in Zululand, Natal, and the Transvaal
“At distances all over the surface of the kraal were the remains of fires, round each of which slept some five-and-twenty Masai, for the most part gorged with food.”
“At length, branching off from Solomon's Great Road, we came to the wide fosse surrounding the kraal, which is at least a mile round, and fenced with a strong palisade of piles formed of the trunks of trees.”
“Before the kraal was a wide open space, and on that space armed men were assembled, several full regiments of them.”
“At last the only sounds within the walls of the kraal were the low whispering of the two boys.”
Dead Man's Land Being the Voyage to Zimbambangwe of certain and uncertain
“The size of the kraal was a matter of no consequence; and, of course, to save labour, a small one was constructed.”
“Taped music carries down the hillside from the hub of the Zulu king's "kraal," one of four traditional palaces in the royal household of the mountainous”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘kraal’.
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Cattle
cattle, cow, beef, steer, heifer, calf, bull, cattle call, Black Angus, Hereford, Holstein, Dwarf Lulu and 402 more...
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11250 more...
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South African
kopje, voortrekker, baas, stoep, veldt, Vaal, kurveyor, lyer, mallemot, milkpox, namaqualite, overberg and 214 more...
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Uncommon and Interesting words
That come in handy, but might make you look like a douchebag.
prurient, lithe, superannuated, wanderlust, sanguine, florid, slugabed, candor, eldritch, superbowl syndrome, indolent, perforce and 37 more...
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Gaw
Words for things both tangible and anthropic. I'm in the process of spinning off hardware into ute, and people into oofy.
cum-twang, naumachia, yngling, juggernaught, bliss ninny, iliac crest, moistened bint, slumlord, spondoolies, classy lady, charnel house, electrodoméstico and 334 more...
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looked up
Words I've come across while reading and looked up in the dictionary.
deesis, pendentive, revetment, aedicule, stemma, patera, ephod, entrepot, corbel, exedra, volute, archivolt and 1408 more...
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foreign affairs
abacost, abra, zamindar, wampum, chobdar, chota-hazri, chandoo, dacoit, Devanagari, dewan, gen-gen, gharry and 87 more...
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New to me
baronial, cruas, ita palm, magnifical, sea cocoa, solempne, magnific, twirlingly, voxel, venust, amaranthine, eximious and 45 more...
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K -- L words
lachanopolist, loxoma, levulosuria, kedotherapy, kymotrichous, laurophile, lienocele, lienomyelogenous, kolyseptic, kimbly, keedug, kiyoodle and 45 more...
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perhapsolutely's Words
polyradiculoneuro..., abulia, abubble, abscission, abaft, zareba, abatis, abigail, abiogenesis, ablate, ablaut, abo and 1705 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for kraal.
yarb Compound for the restraint of livestock. Sep 24, 2007