The supposed relation of Ζωΐλος to ζῆλοςzealn., which is held to account for the association of the notion of malignancy or envy with this word, is reflected in the following:
1597
There..resolution to suffer for there bad causes will intice the ignorant..to thinck that there outragiouse zoyle is a sanctified zeale.
J. Payne, Royall Exchange 23
Meaning & use
1565–
Name of a Greek critic and grammarian (4th century b.c.) famous for his severe criticism of Homer; transferred (with plural Zoili, Zoiluses), a censorious, malignant, or envious critic.
1565
Of him, all malicious carpers of other mens wourkes be called Zoili.
S. Cooper, Dict. Historicum (at cited word), in Thesaurus
1567
Carp not ye cankred Zoiles al, the men Whose labour spente in paynfull toyle hath ben.
J. Sanford, translation of Epictetus, Man. A v b
1575
Although that Zoylus would him spot, Let him doe what he may.
W. Clowes in J. Banister's Treatise Chirurg. In praise of Author
1580
To defende my imperfection, against a sorte of Momus secte, and Zoilus bande.
R. Hitchcock, Pollitique Platt Preface **ij
1609
Zoilisses and Thersitisses.
J. Dowland, translation of A. Ornithoparchus, Micrologus 76
1612
Such as are eminent should be careful of their conuersations when they are besieged with such malitious Zoiles.
R. Sheldon, 1st Sermon after Conversion 47
1636
Carping Zoilusses, or malignant Momusses whom no men can please.
W. Prynne, Remonstrance against Shipmoney Epistle
1818
This formidable Zoilus of the Crawley family.
Lady Morgan, Florence Macarthy (1819) vol. II. ii. 99
a1834
How then comes it that not only single Zoili, but whole nations have combined in unhesitating condemnation of our great dramatist?
S. T. Coleridge, Notes & Lectures (1849) vol. I. 64
Some consonants can take the function of the vowel in unstressed syllables. Where necessary, a syllabic marker diacritic is used, hence /ˈpɛtl/ but /ˈpɛtl̩i/.
Vowels
iːfleece
ihappy
ɪkit
ɛdress
atrap, bath
ɑːstart, palm, bath
ɒlot
ɔːthought, force
ʌstrut
ʊfoot
uːgoose
əletter
əːnurse
ɪənear
ɛːsquare
ʊəcure
eɪface
ʌɪpride
aʊmouth
əʊgoat
ɔɪvoice
ãgratin
ɒ̃salon
ᵻ(/ɪ/-/ə/)
ᵿ(/ʊ/-/ə/)
Other symbols
The symbol ˈ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with primary stress.
The symbol ˌ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with secondary stress.
Round brackets ( ) in a transcription indicate that the symbol within the brackets is optional.
Also 1500s–1600s Zoylus, 1600s Zoilis; also 1500s–1600s anglicized Zoil(e, Zoyl(e.
Frequency
Zoilus typically occurs about 0.02 times per million words in modern written English.
Zoilus is in frequency band 3, which contains words occurring between 0.01 and 0.1 times per million words in modern written English. More about OED's frequency bands
Frequency data is computed programmatically, and should be regarded as an estimate.
Frequency of Zoilus, n., 1750–2010
* Occurrences per million words in written English
Historical frequency series are derived from Google Books Ngrams (version 2), a data set based on the Google Books corpus of several million books printed in English between 1500 and 2010.
The overall frequency for a given word is calculated by summing frequencies for the main form of the word, any plural or inflected forms, and any major spelling variations.
For sets of homographs (distinct entries that share the same word-form, e.g. mole, n.¹, mole, n.², mole, n.³, etc.), we have estimated the frequency of each homograph entry as a fraction of the total Ngrams frequency for the word-form. This may result in inaccuracies.
Smoothing has been applied to series for lower-frequency words, using a moving-average algorithm. This reduces short-term fluctuations, which may be produced by variability in the content of the Google Books corpus.