Hole

How to spell hole

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce hole

What does hole mean?

1. nounA hollow space or gap in or through a solid object or surface.
2. verbTo make a hollow opening in something, or in golf to send the ball into the cup.

Hole in a sentence

• noun

  The rabbit dug a deep hole in the vegetable garden.

• verb

  She lined up the shot and managed to hole the putt from across the green.

• noun

  He tore a hole in his jacket climbing over the fence.

• verb

  The collision could hole the ship below the waterline.

Where does hole come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word comes straight from the Old English 'hol', a noun meaning a hollow place, a cavity, or a den, which in turn grew from the Proto-Germanic root that also gave Dutch 'hol' and German 'Hohl'. That same family lies behind the adjective 'hollow', which shares the underlying idea of empty space carved out within something solid. The spelling stayed remarkably stable through the centuries, keeping its short, blunt form while the closely sounding 'whole' (originally 'hal', meaning healthy or unhurt) kept its silent 'w'. That difference in origin is the whole point of the spelling trap: 'hole' is the empty gap and never takes the 'w', while 'whole' means complete and entire. Because the two have nothing to do with each other historically, remembering that a 'hole' is hollow keeps the simple four-letter spelling in mind.

How the word is built

• hole (single Old English root meaning hollow place; no prefix or suffix)

Words that sound like hole

They sound the same but mean different things, so the meaning decides which spelling to write.

• whole: Complete in extent or amount, with no part missing or left out.