whole
UK /həʊl/ · US /hoʊl/ adjective, adverb, noun
Forms wholer wholest wholes hole
- adjective Entire, undivided. “I ate a whole fish.”
- adjective Used as an intensifier. “I brought a whole lot of balloons for the party. She ate a whole bunch of french fries.”
- adjective Sound, uninjured, healthy. “He is of whole mind, but the same cannot be said about his physical state.”
- adjective (of food) From which none of its constituents has been removed. “whole wheat; whole milk”
- adjective (mining) As yet unworked.
- adverb (colloquial) In entirety; entirely; wholly. “I ate a fish whole!”
- noun Something complete, without any parts missing. “This variety of fascinating details didn't fall together into an enjoyable, coherent whole.”
- noun An entirety.
Synonyms
total complete entire holo- one overall hale well all oak and iron bound buxom fit freck hail hale and hearty healthy in the pink of health lusty normal sound sound as a barrel unit unharmed unhurt unscathed solid unanimous wholly entirely completely totally
Antonyms
Etymology
From Middle English whol, hol, hole (“healthy, unhurt, whole”), from Old English hāl (“healthy, safe”), from Proto-West Germanic *hail, from Proto-Germanic *hailaz (“whole, safe, sound”), from Proto-Indo-European *kéh₂ilos (“healthy, whole”).
The spelling with wh-, attested since ca. 1400, represents an excrescent /w/, which developed in words with initial /(h)ɔː/, /(h)oː/ in southwestern dialects of Middle English. While this pronunciation did not establish itself in the standard language (except in one), the spelling survived in whole and whore, in the former case likely reinforced by a desire to disambiguate from hole.
Compare West Frisian hiel, Low German heel/heil, Dutch heel, German heil, Danish and Norwegian Bokmål hel, Norwegian Nynorsk heil; also Welsh coel (“omen”), Breton kel (“omen, mention”), Old Prussian kails (“healthy”), Old Church Slavonic цѣлъ (cělŭ, “healthy, unhurt”). Related to hale, health, hail, hallow, heal, and holy. False cognate of Ancient Greek ὅλος (hólos).
Webster’s 1913
- adjective Containing the total amount, number, etc.; comprising all the parts; free from deficiency; all; total; entire; as, the whole earth; the whole solar system; the whole army; the whole nation. "On their whole host I flew unarmed." Milton.
- adjective Complete; entire; not defective or imperfect; not broken or fractured; unimpaired; uninjured; integral; as, a whole orange; the egg is whole; the vessel is whole.
- noun The entire thing; the entire assemblage of parts; totality; all of a thing, without defect or exception; a thing complete in itself.
- noun A regular combination of parts; a system.
Etymology [OE. hole, hol, hal, hool, AS. hal well, sound, healthy; akin to OFries. & OS. h, D. heel, G. heil, Icel. heill, Sw. hel whole, Dan. heel, Goth. hails well, sound, OIr. c augury. Cf. Hale, Hail to greet, Heal to cure, Health, Holy.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “whole”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details