shoal
UK/ʃəʊl/
shoal adjective: shallow.
Adjective
shoal (comparative shoaler, superlative shoalest)
- Shallow.
- shoal water
- 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.1819, Lord Byron, Don Juan, III.19
Noun (1)
shoal (plural shoals)
- A sandbank or sandbar creating a shallow.
- '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.1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter I, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y.; London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC
- The god himself with ready trident stands, / And opes the deep, and spreads the moving sands, / Then heaves them off the shoals.1697, Virgil, “Aeneis”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC
- A shallow in a body of water.
- The depth of your pond should be six feet; and on the sides some shoals for the fish to sun themselves in and to lay their spawn.1707, J[ohn] Mortimer, The Whole Art of Husbandry; or, The Way of Managing and Improving of Land. […], London: […] J[ohn] H[umphreys] for H[enry] Mortlock […], and J[onathan] Robinson […], →OCLC
- Wolsey, that once trod the ways of glory, / And sounded all the depths and shoals of honour.1613 (date written), William Shakespeare, [John Fletcher], “The Famous History of the Life of King Henry the Eight”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio)...
Verb (1)
shoal (third-person singular simple present shoals, present participle shoaling, simple past and past participle shoaled)
- To arrive at a shallow (or less deep) area.
- To cause a shallowing; to come to a more shallow part of.
- Noting the rate at which she shoals her water -[…]1859, Matthew Fontaine Maury, Explanations and Sailing Directions to Accompany the Wind and Current Charts
- To become shallow.
- The colour of the water shows where it shoals.
Noun (2)
shoal (plural shoals)
- Any large number of persons or things.
- Shoals of tourists
- great shoals of people1625, Francis [Bacon], “Of Vicissitude of Things”, in The Essayes […], 3rd edition, London: […] Iohn Haviland for Hanna Barret, →OCLC
- A large number of fish (or other sea creatures) of the same species swimming together.
- Beneath, a shoal of silver fishes glides.c. 1661, Edmund Waller, On St. James's Park
- 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.1851, Herman Melville, Moby Dick
Verb (2)
shoal (third-person singular simple present shoals, present participle shoaling, simple past and past participle shoaled)
shoal meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Malayalam
shoal in Tamil
- ஆழமின்மை, திடல், திட்டு, ஆற்றிடைத்திட்டு, மணல் திட்டு, திரளாகச் செல்
shoal in Urdu
- چھچھلا, جھرمٹ, مچھلیوں کا گروہ
shoal in Bengali
- মৎস্যঝাঁক, অগভীর স্থান
shoal in Malayalam
- mudbank, sandbank, bank
- മണൽത്തിട്ട, മണത്തിട്ട, മണൽത്തിട്ട്, പാദചതുരം, പാദചത്വരം, പൊഴി
More languagesFewer languages
- shoal in Kannada
- ಆಳವಿಲ್ಲದೆಡೆ, ಗುಂಪು, ಸಂದಣಿ
- shoal in Sinhala
- වටය waṭaya
- shoal in Assamese
- দীয়া dia
- shoal in Tagalog
- batuharang
- shoal in Persian
- سنار sanâr
Examples of shoal in a sentence
- The upper reaches of this bay are not sailable; there are too many shoals and no dredged channel.
- I told her about grabbling—reaching under rocks at the shoals of the river and pulling out catfish.
- The shoals and reefs of Zhongsha (or the Macclesfield Bank) do not emerge even at low water.
Synonyms of shoal
Forms of shoal
| Adjective | |
|---|---|
| comparative | shoaler |
| superlative | shoalest |
| alternative Scotland | shaul |
| alternative Scotland | shawl |
| alternative Scotland | shauld |
| alternative Scotland | schald |
| alternative Scotland | shaud |
| alternative Scotland | shawd |
| alternative form (dialectal) | sheld |
| alternative form (dialectal) | shole |
| alternative form (dialectal) | shoald |
| alternative form (dialectal) | shold |
| Noun | |
| plural | shoals |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | shoals |
| present participle | shoaling |
| past participle | shoaled |
| past | shoaled |
Origin of shoal
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.
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-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.
Words formed from shoal
Phrases with shoal
Words that rhyme with shoal
47 more rhymesFewer rhymes
- parole
- toll
- dole
- goal
- patrol
- role
- swole
- bricole
- condole
- mole
- noel
- whole
- stroll
- bole
- knoll
- carmagnole
- foal
- pistole
- prole
- Seoul
- stole
- thole
- Tyrol
- baklol
- cajole
- console
- decontrol
- dhole
- droll
- extol
- extrasystole
- gnoll
- hop pole
- indol
- kohl
- memorial pole
- micromole
- mol
- Nicole
- nole
- ole
- parasystole
- schizocoel
- schizocoele
- sowl
- square peg in a round hole
- vole
Questions about shoal
- What does shoal mean?
- Shoal means shallow.
- What is shoal in Tamil?
- Shoal in Tamil is ஆழமின்மை, திடல், திட்டு. See Shoal meaning in Tamil.
- What part of speech is shoal?
- Shoal can be an adjective, a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce shoal?
- Shoal is pronounced /ʃəʊl/ (UK).
Words near shoal in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: shoal (page history and authors); shoal (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); shoal (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); shoal (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); shoal (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); shoal (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); වටය (Sinhala) (page history and authors); দীয়া (Assamese) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-shoal.ogg.
Cite this entry: “shoal.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/shoal. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.