Meaning of soil in English

Table of contents

Verb
soil
Etymology
Middle English (as a verb): from Old French soiller, based on Latin sucula, diminutive of sus‘pig’. The earliest use of the noun (late Middle English) was ‘muddy wallow for wild boar’; current noun senses date from the early 16th century
Definitions
1. make soiled, filthy, or dirty
Examples
- « don't soil your clothes when you play outside! »
Antonyms
- clean
- make clean
Derived terms
Noun
soil
Etymology
late Middle English: from Anglo-Norman French, perhaps representing Latin solium‘seat’, by association with solum‘ground’
Definitions
1. the state of being covered with unclean things
Derived terms
2. the part of the earth's surface consisting of humus and disintegrated rock
3. material in the top layer of the surface of the earth in which plants can grow (especially with reference to its quality or use)
Examples
- « the land had never been plowed »
- « good agricultural soil »
4. the geographical area under the jurisdiction of a sovereign state
Examples
- « American troops were stationed on Japanese soil »

Famous quotes

« The founders of a new colony, whatever Utopia of human virtue and happiness they might originally project, have invariably recognized it among their earliest practical necessities to allot a portion of the virgin soil as a cemetery, and another portion as the site of a prison. »
Nathaniel Hawthorne
« People in cities may forget the soil for as long as a hundred years, but Mother Nature's memory is long and she will not let them forget indefinitely. »
Henry Cantwell Wallace
« A friendship can weather most things and thrive in thin soil but it needs a little mulch of letters and phone calls and small, silly presents every so often - just to save it from drying out completely. »
Pam Brown
« Isn't it the moment of most profound doubt that gives birth to new certainties? Perhaps hopelessness is the very soil that nourishes human hope perhaps one could never find sense in life without first experiencing its absurdity. »
Vaclav Havel
« Pride slays thanksgiving, but a humble mind is the soil out of which thanks naturally grow. A proud man is seldom a grateful man, for he never thinks he gets as much as he deserves. »
Henry Ward Beecher