tale / tāl/ • n. 1. a fictitious or true narrative or story, esp. one that is imaginatively recounted. ∎  a lie.2. archaic a number or total: an exact tale of the dead bodies.PHRASES: tell talessee tell¹ .

tale a tale never loses in the telling proverbial saying, mid 16th century, implying that a story is often exaggerated when it is repeated.
a tale of a tub an apocryphal story; mid 16th century. The phrase was used as the title of a comedy (1633) by Ben Jonson, and then in 1696 (published 1704) as the title of a prose satire by Swift; the allusion was to Hobbes's Leviathan and its criticism of contemporary religion and government.

See also old wives' tale, tales.

tale
A. †talk, discourse OE.; what is told, story, narrative XI;

B. reckoning, number XII. OE. talu = OS. tala (Du. taal speech), OHG. zala (G. zahlnumber), ON. tala talk, tale, number :- Gmc. *talō, f. *tal-, as in *taljan TELL. Sense B was prob. from ON.

Tale

a number of things; a list or series; a tally or total.

Examples : an exact tale of the dead bodies, 1722; tale of fair children, 1864; goodly tale of folios, 1826; of lambs (the total number), 1697; tale of oysters (quantity by which they are sold), 1594; of good works, 1732.