betel

• beetel, beetle (archaic)

Borrowed from Portuguese bétele, from Malayalam വെറ്റില (veṟṟila) or Tamil வெற்றிலை (veṟṟilai).

• IPA^(key): /ˈbiːtəl/
• Homophones: beetle, Beatle

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

betel (usually uncountable, plural betels)

1. Either of two (parts of) plants often used in combination:
   • 1958, R. K. Narayan, The Guide, Penguin, published 1988, page 194:

     Her face was flushed with the tingling effect of betel leaves.

   1. An evergreen Indian creeping shrub, Piper betle, whose dried leaves are chewed with betel nut: the betel pepper.
   2. The betel palm, Areca catechu, and in particular its seed, the areca nut or betel nut.
2. A quid (chewing preparation) containing these and other plant materials; paan.
   • 1869, Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipelago, volume I, London: Macmillan and Co., page 126:

     In a small Bamboo case, prettily carved and ornamented, the Dyak carries his sirih and lime for betel chewing, and his little long-bladed knife has a Bamboo sheath.

   • 1934, George Orwell, chapter 1, in Burmese Days‎^[1]:

     He went to the rail to spit out a scarlet mouthful of betel […]

   • 2002, Vātsyāyana, translated by Wendy Doniger and Sudhir Kakar, Kama Sutra, Oxford University Press, 3.3.16, pp. 83-84:

     Within the range of his powers, he sends her, secretly, […] cosmetics such as red lac, red arsenic, yellow arsenic, red mercury sulphide, and black collyrium; sandalwood paste and saffron; and, in course of time, areca nuts and betel leaves for betel.

• let be

Borrowed from Portuguese bétele \ bétel, from Malayalam വെറ്റില (veṟṟila).

• IPA^(key): /ˈbeː.təl/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: be‧tel
• Rhymes: -eːtəl

betel f (plural betels, no diminutive)

1. betel
   1. betel vine, Piper betle

      Synonym: betelpeper

   2. betel palm, Areca catechu

      Synonyms: betelboom, betelpalm

• betelblad
• betelboom
• betelnoot
• betelpalm
• betelpeper

Borrowed from Dutch beitel (“chisel”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈbə.təl/, [ˈbə.t̪əl]

betel (plural betel-betel)

1. (colloquial) chisel

   Synonym: pahat

• “betel”, in Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia [Great Dictionary of the Indonesian Language] (in Indonesian), Jakarta: Agency for Language Development and Cultivation – Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology of the Republic of Indonesia, 2016
• Alan M. Stevens; A. Ed. Schmidgall-Tellings (2010), A Comprehensive Indonesian-English Dictionary‎^[2], second edition, Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, →ISBN

• IPA^(key): /ˈbɛ.tel/
• Rhymes: -ɛtel
• Hyphenation: bè‧tel

betel m (invariable)

1. betel leaf, Piper betle

• betel in Treccani.it – Vocabolario Treccani on line, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana

• betell, beetel

From Old English bȳtel, bīetel (“hammer”), from Proto-West Germanic *bautil (“hammer, mallet”), equivalent to beten +‎ -le.

• IPA^(key): /ˈbeːtəl/

betel (plural betels)

1. mallet, maul, hammer
2. bat, club, cudgel

• batildore

• English: beetle
• ⇒ Yola: balbeedhel

• “bẹ̄tel, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007.

Borrowed from Portuguese bétele, from Malayalam വെറ്റില (veṟṟila).

• IPA^(key): /ˈbɛ.tɛl/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛtɛl
• Syllabification: be‧tel

betel m inan

1. betel, betel pepper (Piper betle)

   Synonyms: pieprz betelowy, pieprz żuwny

2. betel (chewing preparation)

• betel in Polish dictionaries at PWN

Borrowed from French bétel.

betel m (plural beteli)

1. (botany) betel

betel m (plural beteles)

1. betel

• “betel”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8.1, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 15 December 2025