shoal

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English

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Pronunciation

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  • (UK) IPA(key): /ʃəʊl/
  • Audio (US):(file)
  • Rhymes: -əʊl

Etymology 1

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From Middle English schold, scholde, from Old English sċeald (“shallow”), perhaps from Proto-Germanic *skalidaz, past participle of *skaljaną (“to go dry, dry up, become shallow”), from *skalaz (“parched, shallow”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kelh₁- (“to dry out”). Cognate with Low German Scholl (“shallow water”), German schal (“stale, flat, vapid”). Compare shallow.

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Alternative forms

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Adjective

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shoal (comparative shoaler, superlative shoalest)

  1. (now rare) Shallow.
    shoal water
    • 1819, Lord Byron, Don Juan, III.19:
      But that part of the coast being shoal and bare, / And rough with reefs which ran out many a mile, / His port lay on the other side o' the isle.
    • 1883, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island:
      All told, we had scarce two miles to run; but the navigation was delicate, the entrance to this northern anchorage was not only narrow and shoal, but lay east and west, so that the schooner must be nicely handled to be got in.

Noun

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shoal (plural shoals)

  1. A sandbank or sandbar creating a shallow.
    Synonyms: bank, bar
    • 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter I, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y., London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:
      'Twas early June, the new grass was flourishing everywheres, the posies in the yard—peonies and such—in full bloom, the sun was shining, and the water of the bay was blue, with light green streaks where the shoal showed.
    • 1697, Virgil, “Aeneis”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:
      The god himself with ready trident stands, / And opes the deep, and spreads the moving sands, / Then heaves them off the shoals.
  2. A shallow in a body of water.
Synonyms
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Derived terms
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Translations
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Verb

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shoal (third-person singular simple present shoals, present participle shoaling, simple past and past participle shoaled)

  1. To arrive at a shallow (or less deep) area.
  2. (transitive) To cause a shallowing; to come to a more shallow part of.
    • 1859, Matthew Fontaine Maury, Explanations and Sailing Directions to Accompany the Wind and Current Charts:
      Noting the rate at which she shoals her water - […]
  3. To become shallow.
    The colour of the water shows where it shoals.

Etymology 2

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1570, presumably from Middle English *schole (“school of fish”), from Old English sċeolu, sċolu (“troop or band of people, host, multitude, division of army, school of fish”), from Proto-West Germanic *skolu, from Proto-Germanic *skulō (“crowd”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kelH- (“to divide, split, separate”).

Cognate with West Frisian skoal (“shoal”), Middle Low German schōle (“multitude, troop”), Dutch school (“shoal of fishes”). Doublet of school.

Noun

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shoal (plural shoals)

  1. Any large number of persons or things.
  2. (collective) A large number of fish (or other sea creatures) of the same species swimming together.
    • c. 1661, Edmund Waller, On St. James's Park
      Beneath, a shoal of silver fishes glides.
    • 1851, Herman Melville, Moby Dick:
      He came directly from the shoal which we had just before entered, and in which we had struck three of his companions, as if fired with revenge for their sufferings.
Synonyms
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Translations
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Verb

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shoal (third-person singular simple present shoals, present participle shoaling, simple past and past participle shoaled)

  1. To collect in a shoal; to throng.
    The fish shoaled about the place.

Anagrams

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