instrumental word-forming element, expressing "appliance, tool," from Old English -ol, -ul, -el, representing PIE *-lo- (see -ule). In modern English usually -le except after -n-. As in treadle, ladle, thimble, handle, spindle, girdle; also compare dialectal thrashle "flail, implement for thrashing," from Old English ðerscel, Middle English scrapel "instrument for scraping" (mid-14c.), etc.
1580s, "to separate grains from wheat, etc., by beating," dialectal variant of threshen (see thresh). Sense of "beat (someone) with (or as if with) a flail" is first recorded 1620s. Meaning "to make wild movements like those of a flail or whip" is attested from 1846. Related: Thrashed; thrashing. As a noun from 1660s, "threshing tool;" 1840s as "a beating;" 1982 as the name for a type of fast heavy metal music.
1530s, "action of battering," in law, "the unlawful beating of another," from French batterie, from Old French baterie "beating, thrashing, assault" (12c.), from batre "to beat," from Latin battuere (see batter (v.)).
The meaning shifted in French from "bombardment" ("heavy blows" upon city walls or fortresses) to "unit of artillery" (a sense recorded in English from 1550s). The extension to "electrical cell" (1748, in Ben Franklin) is perhaps from the artillery sense via notion of "discharges" of electricity. In Middle English, bateri meant only "forged metal ware." In obsolete baseball jargon battery was the word for "pitcher and catcher" considered as a unit (1867, originally only the pitcher).
c. 1300, doseine, "collection of twelve things or units," from Old French dozaine "a dozen, a number of twelve" in various usages, from doze (12c.) "twelve," from Latin duodecim "twelve," from duo "two" (from PIE root *dwo- "two") + decem "ten" (from PIE root *dekm- "ten"). The Old French fem. suffix -aine is characteristically added to cardinals to form collectives in a precise sense ("exactly 12," not "about 12").
The Latin word's descendants are widespread: Spanish docena, Dutch dozijn, German dutzend, Danish dusin, Russian duizhina, etc. The dozens "invective contest" (1928) originated in slave culture, the custom is probably African, the word probably from bulldoze (q.v.) in its original sense of "a whipping, a thrashing."
mid-14c., "rule, control," verbal noun from dress (v.). In some Middle English uses also short for addressing. In cookery, "sauce used in preparing a dish for the table," from c. 1500. Meaning "bandage applied to a wound or sore" is by 1713.
Dressing-gown "a loose and easy robe worn while applying makeup or doing the hair" is attested from 1777; dressing-room "room intended to be used for dressing" is from 1670s. Dressing-up "act or fact of attiring oneself with attention to style and fashion" is by 1852. Dressing-down (n.) "a reprimand" is by 1839, American English, originally "a thrashing," perhaps ironic or extended from some 19c. mechanical or commercial sense.
