bail [ME] The spelling bail represents several different words. The one meaning ‘temporary release of an accused person’ came via French from Latin bajulare, ‘to bear a burden’, and is related to bailiff [ME], someone who bears the burden of responsibility. The Latin word is also behind the source of bail (in Britain also spelled bale) meaning ‘to scoop water out of a boat’, from an old word for bucket based on Latin bajulus ‘carrier’. The bailey [ME] or outer wall of a castle has a quite different origin, but it is connected with the third bail, a crosspiece on a cricket stump; bailey the defence goes back to Old French baile ‘palisade’, which probably itself goes back to Latin baculum ‘rod, stick’, which is what a cricket bail is (see also bacillus). Bailing out from an aircraft [E20th] may be a development of the ‘to scoop water’ sense. It was at first spelled bale out, though, and could come from the idea of letting a bale of straw though a trapdoor in a barn. The first written record dates from 1930. The hay bale [ME] has the basic idea of something bundled and is related to *ball.