shoal

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   A large group of fish swimming together.

   A shoal of silver fish darted past the diver.

2. 2
   noun

   A shallow area in the sea or a river, often a sandbank.

   The captain steered carefully to avoid the hidden shoal.

3. 3
   adj

   Of water, shallow.

   The boat ran aground in the shoal water near the shore.

Simplified etymology

Shoal is recorded from Old English and shares a root with the unrelated late Middle English sense of school referring to a group of fish or sea mammals. That sense of school comes from early German and Dutch schōle, “troop” or “multitude.”

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.

Topics

External links

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