alone

Meanings

1. 1
   adv

   without anybody else or anything else

   the child stayed home alone

2. 2
   adj

   By oneself, solitary.

   I can't ask for help because I am alone.

3. 3
   adj

   Lacking peers who share one's beliefs, experiences, practices, etc.

   Senator Craddock wants to abolish the estate tax, and she's not alone.

4. 4
   adj

   Apart from, or exclusive of, others.

   There are proofs enough in History, and first that beautiful Hynes, so much beloved by Charles the seventh King of France, who valued the alone possession of her Love at so high a rate, that[…]

5. 5
   adj

   Mere; consisting of nothing further.

   and therefore all Killing, Banishing, Fining, Imprisoning, and other such things, which Men are afflicted with, for the alone exercise of their Conscience, or difference in Worship or Opinion, proceedeth from the spirit of Cain, the Murderer, and is contrary to the Truth;

6. 6
   adj

   Unique; rare; matchless.

   Pardon me, Proteus, all I can is nothing / To her, whose worth makes other worthies nothing; / She is alone.

7. 7
   adv

   By oneself; apart from, or exclusive of, others; solo.

   She walked home alone.

8. 8
   adv

   Without outside help.

   The job was too hard for me to do alone.

Etymology

From Middle English allone, from earlier all oon (“alone”, literally “all one”), contracted from the Old English phrase eall ān (“completely alone”), equivalent to al- (“all”) + one. Cognate with Scots alane (“alone”), Saterland Frisian alleene (“alone”), West Frisian allinne (“alone”), Dutch alleen (“alone”), Low German alleen (“alone”), German allein (“alone”), Danish alene (“alone”), Swedish allena (“alone”). More at all and one. Regarding the different phonological development of alone and one, see the note in one.