Word.ws English Dictionary

staple

UK/ˈsteɪ.pəl/

staple noun: a town containing merchants who have exclusive right, under royal authority, to purchase or produce certain goods for export; also, the body of such merchants seen as a group.

staple: a town containing merchants who have exclusive right, under royal authority, to purchase or produce...
Image: “Keith S Brown ( Ksbrown )”, CC BY-SA 2.5, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun (1)

staple (countable and uncountable, plural staples)

  1. (historical) A town containing merchants who have exclusive right, under royal authority, to purchase or produce certain goods for export; also, the body of such merchants seen as a group.
    • The customs of Alexandria were very great, it having been the staple of the Indian trade.1727, John Arbuthnot, Tables of Ancient Coins, Weights and Measures. Explain'd and exemplify'd in several dissertations
    • For the increase of trade and the encouragement of the worthy burgesses of Woodstock, her majesty was minded to erect the town into a staple for wool.1821 January 8, [Walter Scott], Kenilworth; a Romance. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Co.; and John Ballantyne, […]; London: Hurst, Robinson...
  2. (broadly) Place of supply; source.
    • Whitehall naturally became the chief staple of news. Whenever there was a rumour that anything important had happened or was about to happen, people hastened thither to obtain intelligence from the fountain head.1849–1861, Thomas Babington Macaulay, chapter III, in The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, volume (please specify |volume=I to V), London: Longman, Brown, Green, and...
  3. The principal commodity produced in a town or region.
    • The old staple of coal is a declining traffic; and what remains tends to be hauled a shorter distance, as new power stations are sited closer to coalfields.1961 October, “Editorial: The importance of the "Roadrailer"”, in Trains Illustrated, page 577
  4. A basic or essential supply.
    • Rice is a staple in the diet of many cultures.
  5. A recurring topic, character, or item.
    • Lurid stories are a staple of tabloid journalism.
    • In most countries, rubbish makes headlines only when it is not collected, and stinking sacks lie heaped on the streets. In Britain bins are a front-page staple.2010, The Economist, Jul-Aug 2010, p. 27
  6. Short fiber, as of cotton, sheep’s wool, or the like, which can be spun into yarn or thread.
    • Tow is flax with short staple.
  7. Unmanufactured material; raw material.

Verb (1)

staple (third-person singular simple present staples, present participle stapling, simple past and past participle stapled)

  1. (transitive) To sort according to its staple.
    • to staple cotton

Adjective

staple (not comparable)

  1. Relating to, or being market of staple for, commodities.
    • a staple town
  2. Established in commerce; occupying the markets; settled.
    • a staple trade
    • To ruin with worse ware our staple trade1667, John Dryden, Annus Mirabilis: The Year of Wonders, 1666. […], London: […] Henry Herringman, […], →OCLC, (please specify the stanza number)
  3. Fit to be sold; marketable.
    • What needy writer would not solicit to work under such masters, who will pay us beforehand, take off as much of our ware as we please, at our own rates, and trouble not themselves to examine, either before or after they have bought it, whether it be staple, or not.1714 February, [Jonathan Swift], The Publick Spirit of the Whigs: Set forth in Their Generous Encouragement of the Author of the Crisis: […], London: […] [John Barber] for John Morphew, […], →OCLC
  4. Regularly produced or manufactured in large quantities; belonging to wholesale traffic; principal; chief.
    • wool, the great staple commodity of England1818, Henry Hallam, View of the state of Europe during the Middle ages
    • The pastoral industry, which had weathered the severe depression of the early forties by recourse to boiling down the sheep for their tallow, and was now firmly re-established as the staple industry of the colony, was threatened once more with eclipse.1929, M. Barnard Eldershaw, A House Is Built, Chapter VIII, Section ii

Noun (2)

staple (plural staples)

  1. A wire fastener, made of thin wire, used to secure stacks of paper by penetrating all the sheets and curling around.
    • They stapled the documents with an office stapler, putting a staple in the top left corner of each one.
  2. A wire fastener, in any of various sizes, used to secure something else by penetrating and curling.
    • They stapled the housewrap with a staple gun firing large staples.
  3. A U-shaped wire fastener, made of thick wire, used to attach fence wire or other material to posts or structures.
    • The rancher used staples to attach the barbed wire to the fence posts.
    • Esther's wrists were firmly tied, and the twisted rope was fastened to a strong staple in a heavy wooden joist above, near the fire-place. Here she stood, on a bench, her arms tightly drawn over her breast. Her back and shoulders were bare to the waist.1855, Frederick Douglass, chapter 3, in My Bondage and My Freedom. […], New York; Auburn, N.Y.: Miller, Orton & Mulligan […], →OCLC
  4. One of a set of U-shaped metal rods hammered into a structure, such as a piling or wharf, which serve as a ladder.
    • Fortunately, there were staples in the quay wall, and she was able to climb out of the water.
  5. A metal loop used to fasten doors in conjunction with a hasp and a padlock.
  6. A shaft, smaller and shorter than the principal one, joining different levels.
  7. A small pit.
  8. A district granted to an abbey.
    • [Henry II] also granted liberty of coyning to certain Cities and Abbies, allowing them one staple and two puncheons at a rate, with certain restrictions.1605, William Camden, “Money”, in Remaines Concerning Britain
  9. (obsolete) A post; prop; support

Verb (2)

staple (third-person singular simple present staples, present participle stapling, simple past and past participle stapled)

  1. (transitive) To secure with a staple.

Proper noun capitalized: Staple

Staple (countable and uncountable, plural Staples)

  1. A village and civil parish in Dover district, Kent, England (OS grid ref TR2756).
  2. A habitational surname from Middle English.

staple meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali

staple in Hindi

basic food
प्रमुख खाद्य pramukh khādya

staple in Tamil

மூலப்பொருள், முகைமைப் பொருள், அடிப்படைத் தேவை, இன்றியமையாத பொருள், முக்கிய வணிகப்பொருள், இழை

staple in Urdu

بنیادی شئے

staple in Bengali

প্রধান পণ্য, স্ট্যাপলারের পিন
More languagesFewer languages
staple in Malayalam
മുഖ്യ, പ്രധാന, അഗ്ര, അഗ്രഗണ്യ
staple in Kannada
ಬಾಗುಸರಿಗೆ, ಬಾಗುಕಂಬಿ, ಕೊಕ್ಕೆ ತಂತಿ, ಬಾಗುತಂತಿ
staple in Punjabi
ਸਟੈਪਲ
staple in Gujarati
સ્ટેપલ
staple in Tagalog
pikolete
staple in Thai
ลวดเย็บกระดาษ lûuat-yép-grà-dàat
staple in Vietnamese
ghim

Examples of staple in a sentence

  • Back-formations, such as tambour (for “play the tambourine”), are a staple of comedic wordplay.
  • The mad scientist was a staple character in many horror films.
  • Red beans and rice is a staple on our Monday-night dinner table.

All 40 example sentences with staple

Forms of staple

Noun
pluralstaples
Verb
third-person singular presentstaples
present participlestapling
past participlestapled
paststapled
Proper noun
pluralStaples

Past tense of staple: stapled

Plural of staple: staples

Origin of staple

From Middle English staple, from Anglo-Norman estaple, Old French estaple (“market, (trading) post”), from Late Latin stapula, from Frankish *stapul, ultimately from Proto-Germanic *stapulaz (“post”), from Proto-Indo-European *stebʰ- (“post, stem”). Compare staff. Doublet of étape and etymology 2.

From Middle English stapel (“staple, pillar, post”), from Old English stapol (“post, pillar”), from Proto-West Germanic *stapul, from Proto-Germanic *stapulaz, from Proto-Indo-European *stebʰ- (“post, stem”). See also Old English steppan (“to step”) and Old French estaple (“post”). Consider also stapes (“stirrup”), from Latin. Doublet of étape and etymology 1.

From Middle English stapel (“staple”).

Words formed from staple

Phrases with staple

Words that rhyme with staple

Questions about staple

What does staple mean?
Staple means a town containing merchants who have exclusive right, under royal authority, to purchase or produce certain goods for export; also, the body of such merchants seen as a group.
What is staple in Hindi?
Staple in Hindi is प्रमुख खाद्य (pramukh khādya). See Staple meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is staple?
Staple can be a noun, a verb, an adjective or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce staple?
Staple is pronounced /ˈsteɪ.pəl/ (UK).
What is the plural of staple?
The plural of staple is staples.

Words near staple in the dictionary

  1. staphylotomies
  2. staphylotomy
  3. staphylotoxin
  4. staphylotoxins
  5. staphyloxanthin
  6. staple
  7. staple character
  8. staple characters
  9. staple gun
  10. staple guns
  11. Staple Hill

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: staple (page history and authors); Staple (page history and authors); staple (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); staple (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); staple (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); staple (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); staple (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); staple (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); staple (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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-staple.ogg.

Cite this entry: “staple.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/staple. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.