ETYMOLOGY
from the Hebrew proper name Nabal (a wealthy sheep owner who refused to pay tribute to King David for protecting his flocks),
from nabal (a disgraceful, impious, or villainous person)
from nabal (to be foolish, act foolishly)
EXAMPLE
“…As for those men that resemble the rigorous iudge, that neither feare God, nor good man, that neuer thinke of the saluation of their sinful seduced soules, that either be Athiestes or Libertines or Machiuelians or Spend-thriftes or couetous Nabals or great Gamsters or Luxurious and Riotous persons or seditious and traiterous papists, are no fitte men to bee such a husband as I propose …”
From: A sermon preached at Trafford in Lancashire
By William Massie, 1586
PRONUNCIATION
NAY-buhl
Lexicophilia 