Bucket or Pail?

[smudge]

What's the difference between a bucket & a pail please?

(My parents always called it a pail, but I've always called it a bucket).

[silly moo]

Just double checked in a dictionary and as I thought there is no difference.
I call it a bucket as well.

[rod]

You kick the bucket; pail is what you look like before!A pail made off wood to fetch water a bucket a later invention made of metal? Not sure smudge!

[jno]

My Oxford dictionary just defines a pail as a bucket (but at least it doesn't define a bucket as a pail) - so no difference there.

[flaming]

I think it might be a generation thing.  'Pail' is older I think, as Jack and Jill fetched a pail of water, and there were milk pails.  You wouldn't say 'milk bucket'.  My nan was from East Anglia, then a very rural region, and she always said 'pail'.  It became an 'uncool' word almost by a common consent and people switched to 'bucket' without knowing why.   I wonder whether  'bucket' was regional and the word 'won out'. 

 I wonder, too, whether manufacturing/materials made a difference earlier on, but that difference has been lost in the mists of time.

[Quizmonster]

Nowadays, there is no difference in normal British English usage, Smudge. However, 'pail' predates 'bucket' by about 300 years.
'Pail' comes ultimately from the Latin 'patella', meaning a small dish...as in the medical word for a kneecap...first appearing in English around 1000 AD as 'p�gel' = a measure of wine. It also has connections with Old French 'paelle', meaning a pan or bath. 
'Bucket' probably comes from Old French 'buket', meaning a wash-tub or milk-pail, and found its way into English around 1300 AD.
Time has simply blended the meanings.

[Quizmonster]

When I said "no difference" above, I did not, of course, include idiomatic phrases such as 'kick the bucket'!

[smudge]

Thank you all - just as I thought - no difference!

My parents were originally from London, then moved to Essex. When I was growing up in the 50's, the word pail always sounded very 'uncool' to me!

QM - thank you as always, for the original meanings of the words.

[Gef]

Just wondered quizzie, does paella come from the French "paelle" because of the large pan it is cooked in?

[jno]

lifted from a website:

Many of you who fell asleep during your language classes might think that the pa in paella might mean "pan," but you would be wrong; it actually means, "to drink." Derived from the Latin term pa (which originally comes from the Sanskrit language), paterna, patina, and patella all mean "a chalice or a culinary utensil used for frying." Patina and patella eventually became known as a pan or "paella" during Roman times.

When the Romans originally introduced the paella pan to Spain, it had a concave bottom. It has since evolved into a round, flat-bottomed pan which exposes the entire base to the heat.

[flaming]

OK, but none of that explains why smudge's parents called the object a 'pail' and smudge says 'bucket'. I still say that in modern usage it became more acceptable to call the object 'bucket' from about the 1950s.  'Pail' seemed so old-fashioned, belonging with 'mangle' and 'copper'.  Country people, particularly, had called the same object 'pail' from the turn of the century, maybe before, perhaps? 

There also is the possibility that 'pail' was the ascendant word for a time, with 'bucket' seemingly old-fashioned, in whatever age that was!   Back and forth, over the ages.  Perhaps the object had a name which was cast aside in favour of the Latin 'new' word!

[Quizmonster]

As I explained above, Flaming, both words are 700+ years old in English! Clearly, they will at different times and in different regions have enjoyed a greater or lesser force in popular usage. At the moment, it appears to be 'bucket' which is in the ascendant and that's all we can say about the matter.
Usage changes...simple as that. For example, I myself can recall a time when I would have been quite happy to tell friends that I had been the centre of attention at a 'gay' party the night before. I'd need to think twice about saying any such thing nowadays!

[smudge]

All my posts have been banned, so once again Thank You to all who answered my question!

[Hippy]

Awww Quizzzy! They're the only sort of parties worth going to. Are you just being a bit miffed at no longer being the pi�ce ma�tresse? C'est la vie, mon ami, l� prix de l'experience!

[Quizmonster]

You may well be right, Hippy. (Is a "pi�ce ma�tresse" a "bit of a mattress"? If so, you're right...I'm 'way past it!)

[gastwo]

When I was a lad a pail was a light weight blue and white enamelled job, and a bucket was a more heavy galvanised container...

[smudge]

Thank you all.

[captainjacksir]

When I was growing up on my Grandfather's farm we had many pails and buckets laying around. Pails were containers with larger bases than top openings (an upside down bucket) for carrying water and milk. Buckets were used to carry everything else. I don't think anyone makes pails anymore, since carrying water and milk are no longer a big part of farm life. No one confused a pail and a bucket where I grew up.
In regards to units of measure, a pail or bucket is not a unit of measure--pail or buckets can be had in one, two, three....gallons, liters, etc. The only difference is which end the bottom is on --the small end (bucket) or the large end (pail). Now it's settled.
Jack

[captainjacksir]

When I was growing up on my Grandfather's farm we had many pails and buckets laying around. Pails were containers with larger bases than top openings (an upside down bucket) for carrying water and milk. Buckets were used to carry everything else. I don't think anyone makes pails anymore, since carrying water and milk are no longer a big part of farm life. No one confused a pail and a bucket where I grew up.
In regards to units of measure, a pail or bucket is not a unit of measure--pail or buckets can be had in one, two, three....gallons, liters, etc. The only difference is which end the bottom is on --the small end (bucket) or the large end (pail). Now it's settled.
Jack