pile

noun

A mass of things heaped together; a heap.

(informal) A group or list of related items up for consideration, especially in some kind of selection process.

A mass formed in layers.

A funeral pile; a pyre.

(slang) A large amount of money.

A large building, or mass of buildings.

A bundle of pieces of wrought iron to be worked over into bars or other shapes by rolling or hammering at a welding heat; a fagot.

A vertical series of alternate disks of two dissimilar metals (especially copper and zinc), laid up with disks of cloth or paper moistened with acid water between them, for producing a current of electricity; a voltaic pile, or galvanic pile.

(architecture, civil engineering) A beam, pole, or pillar, driven completely into the ground, usually as one of a group that constitutes a foundation.

An atomic pile; an early form of nuclear reactor.

A list or league

The head of an arrow or spear.

A large stake, or piece of pointed timber, steel etc., driven into the earth or sea-bed for the support of a building, a pier, or other superstructure, or to form a cofferdam, etc.

(heraldry) One of the ordinaries or subordinaries having the form of a wedge, usually placed palewise, with the broadest end uppermost.

(usually in the plural) A hemorrhoid.

Hair, especially when very fine or short; the fine underfur of certain animals. (Formerly countable, now treated as a collective singular.)

The raised hairs, loops or strands of a fabric; the nap of a cloth.

A battery consisting of repeated units of alternating types of metal; voltaic pile.

A surname.

(obsolete) The reverse (or tails) of a coin.

(obsolete) A dart; an arrow.

(historical, electrochemistry) A battery (simple device for converting chemical potential energy into usable electricity).

verb

(transitive, often used with the preposition "up") To lay or throw into a pile or heap; to heap up; to collect into a mass; to accumulate

(transitive) To cover with heaps; or in great abundance; to fill or overfill; to load.

(transitive) To add something to a great number.

(transitive) (of vehicles) To create a hold-up.

(transitive, military) To place (guns, muskets, etc.) together in threes so that they can stand upright, supporting each other.

(intransitive) To form a pile or heap.

(transitive) To drive piles into; to fill with piles; to strengthen with piles.

(transitive) To give a pile to; to make shaggy.

Roots

pilapile- · Latin · pillar, mole of stone

Synonyms for pile

heapn stackn cumulationn moundn wadn batchn bundlen slewn messn tonsn amassv packn

Synonyms & related words for pile

Find synonyms, related words, and the definition of pile — including heap, stack, cumulation, mound, wad, batch. Dendril is a free visual thesaurus that shows them on an interactive map where stronger matches sit closer to the center — no signup, no ads.

Words related to pile

Explore words related to pile — words associated with it, words that go with it, and its nearest matches in meaning. Related words include unpile, dustheap, pily, slagheap, restack, acervate, tumular, megabucks. Click any word to make it the center of the map and keep exploring the web of connections.

Synonyms for pile

Common synonyms for pile include heap, stack, cumulation, mound, wad, batch, bundle, slew — words that share a close meaning. Hover or tap any word on the map for its definition and part of speech.

Where does pile come from?

The word pile breaks down into one root of Latin origin: the root pile, from Latin pila (“pillar, mole of stone”). Explore each root to see other English words built from the same source.