A Quick and Simple Dictionary

bell

1. Proper noun.  A Scottish and northern English surname for a bell ringer, bellmaker, or from someone who lived "at the Bell (inn)".
2. Proper noun.  The Bell telephone company (after (w, Alexander Graham Bell) , the inventor of the telephone.).
3. Proper noun.  (given name, male) occasionally transferred from the surname.
4. Proper noun.  ''A female given name'', a variant of Belle; mostly used as a middle name in the 19th century.
5. Noun.  (US, Canada) a telephone utility; a Baby Bell.
6. Noun.  A percussive instrument made of metal or other hard material, typically but not always in the shape of an inverted cup with a flared rim, which resonates when struck.
7. Noun.  The sounding of a bell as a signal.
8. Noun.  (chiefly, British) A telephone call.
9. Noun.  A signal at a school that tells the students when it's time to change classes during the day.
10. Noun.  (music) The flared end of a brass or woodwind instrument.
11. Noun.  (nautical) Any of a series of strokes on a bell (or similar), struck every half hour to indicate the time (within a four hour watch).
12. Verb.  (transitive) To attach a bell to.
13. Verb.  To shape so that flares out like a bell.
14. Verb.  (slang, transitive) To telephone..
15. Verb.  (intransitive) To bellow or roar.
16. Noun.  The bellow or bay of certain animals, such as a hound on the hunt or a stag in rut.