trawl

/tɹɔːl/

Etymology

16th century, borrowed from Dutch tragelen (“to pull with a towline, trawl”), from Middle Dutch traghelen, from traghel (“dragnet”) (presumably from Latin tragula (“dragnet”)), and as such root-cognate with English drag and dray.

noun

  1. A net or dragnet used for trawling.
  2. A long fishing line having many short lines bearing hooks attached to it; a setline.
  3. An exhaustive search.“I embarked on a trawl through my uncle's papers in search of his missing will.”

verb

  1. To take (fish or other marine animals) with a trawl.“The fisherman went out to trawl the deep sea for shrimp.”
  2. To fish from a slow-moving boat.“They used a large net to trawl for fish along the coast.”
  3. To make an exhaustive search for something within a defined area.“We need to trawl through the data to find meaningful patterns.”