Definition of "quell"
quell1
verb
third-person singular simple present quells, present participle quelling, simple past and past participle quelled
(transitive) To subdue, put down, or silence (someone or something); to force (someone) to submit.
Quotations
The nation obeyed the call, rallied round the sovereign, and enabled him to quell the disaffected minority.
1849–1861, Thomas Babington Macaulay, chapter 1, in The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, volumes (please specify |volume=I to V), London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans
noun
plural quells
Quotations
The consequences have not been significant in terms of the quell of any of the three drugs into the United States.
1994, United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on the Judiciary, U.S. international drug control policy: recent experience, future options : seminar proceedings, Government Printing Office
But to make things even worse, this is the year of the Seventy-fifth Hunger Games, and that means it's also a Quarter Quell. They occur every twenty-five years, marking the anniversary of the districts' defeat with over-the-top celebrations and, for extra fun, some miserable twist for the tributes.
2013, Suzanne Collins, Catching Fire, UK: Scholastic
quell2
noun
plural quells
A source, especially a spring.
Quotations
Other excruciations replaced her namesake's loquacious quells so completely that when, during a lucid interval, she happened to open with her weak little hand a lavabo cock for a drink of water, the tepid lymph replied in its own lingo […]
1969, Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov, Ada, Or, Ardor, a Family Chronicle, Vintage
The strategists had access to a wide array of private polling and information from focus groups; a quell of information stretching back over his years as a state-wide candidate and office holder.
2001, Hans-Dieter Klingemann, Andrea Römmele, Public Information Campaigns and Opinion Research: A Handbook for the Student and Practitioner, SAGE, page 82