Sole

How to spell sole

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce sole

What does sole mean?

1. adjectiveBeing the only one; single and not shared with others.
2. nounThe bottom surface of a foot, shoe, or boot that touches the ground.
3. nounA flat edible saltwater fish often served as a fillet.

Sole in a sentence

• adjective

  She was the sole owner of the small bakery.

• noun

  The sole of her left boot had worn smooth after the long hike.

• noun

  She ordered grilled sole with lemon and buttered potatoes.

• adjective

  The sole purpose of the meeting was to approve the budget.

• noun

  The cobbler glued a new rubber sole onto the old shoe.

• noun

  The fishmonger filleted a fresh sole for the evening special.

Where does sole come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This compact little word actually braids together two different Latin threads that happen to land on the same spelling. The adjective sole, meaning 'only' or 'single', descends from the Latin solus, meaning 'alone' or 'by oneself', which reached English through Old French in the 1300s and is the same root that gives us 'solo', 'solitary', and 'desolate'. The other sole, the underside of a foot or shoe, comes instead from the Latin solea, meaning 'sandal' or 'the flat bottom of a shoe', a word tied to solum, 'the ground' or 'the bottom'. The flatfish called sole takes its name from that same solea, because its flat, oval body looked to early observers like the sole of a sandal lying on the seabed. All of these arrived in English well before 1500, and the shared spelling is exactly why writers must keep sole distinct from its homophone soul, which is an entirely unrelated native Old English word for the spirit.

How the word is built

• sole (from Latin solus: alone; and Latin solea: sandal, the underside of a shoe)

Words that sound like sole

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

• soul: The spiritual or immaterial part of a person, often regarded as immortal.