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Noun
The day before, at the spot where Captain James Cook first landed in Australia in 1770 — now a national park — a smattering of families sprawled out on grassy knolls and enjoyed a leisurely, sunny afternoon.—Victoria Kim, New York Times, 4 Feb. 2025 The show is a display of staged orderly chaos, models walking across a hilly, grassy arena, crossing in and out around the little knolls, never disturbing or interrupting each other’s paths.—Aamina Inayat Khan, StyleCaster, 21 Jan. 2025 In Viñales, limestone knolls, or mogotes, emerge from the valley's bloodred earth like upturned loaves.—Lydia Bell, Condé Nast Traveler, 24 Dec. 2024 This time, of course, there would be heightened Secret Service protection, complete with drones and dogs to ferret out any potential assassins hiding out in the bushes or in a grassy knoll.—Peter Lucas, Boston Herald, 21 Sep. 2024 See all Example Sentences for knoll
Word History
Etymology
Noun
Middle English knol, from Old English cnoll; akin to Old Norse knollr mountaintop
Verb
Middle English, probably alteration of knellen to knell
First Known Use
Noun
before the 12th century, in the meaning defined above
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