soil

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   The top layer of earth in which plants grow.

   We bought a bag of soil for the houseplants.

2. 2
   verb

   To make something dirty.

   Try not to soil your clothes when you play outside.

3. 3
   noun

   The land of a particular country.

   American troops were stationed on foreign soil.

Appears in

Simplified etymology

The noun soil came from Old French and originally meant a land or country, then the ground and eventually the layer of earth in which plants grow. The unrelated verb soil, “make dirty,” comes from Old French soiller, based on Latin sucula “little pig,” probably through the idea of turning a place into a pigsty.

From Middle English soile, soyle, sule (“ground, earth”), partly from Anglo-Norman soyl (“bottom, ground, pavement”), from Latin solium (“seat, chair; throne”), mistaken for Latin solum (“ground, foundation, earth, sole of the foot”); and partly from Old English sol (“mud, mire, wet sand”), from Proto-Germanic *sulą (“mud, spot”), from Proto-Indo-European *sūl- (“thick liquid”). Cognate with Middle Low German söle (“dirt, mud”), Middle Dutch sol (“dirt, filth”), Middle High German sol, söl (“dirt, mud, mire”), Danish søle (“mud, muck”). Compare French seuil (“level; threshold”) and sol (“soil,…

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