# whole

Pronunciation: say "HOHL" US /hoʊl/, UK /həʊl/

## Adjective

1. Complete in itself, with nothing taken away or split off.
   - Simple: Complete and not divided or broken into parts.
   - _The storm knocked out power across the whole city for two days._
   - _He read the whole report before the meeting began._
2. Used to emphasize the full extent or degree of something, often with a sense of surprise or scale.
   - Simple: Used to make something sound stronger, meaning the full amount or extent.
   - _Moving abroad opened up a whole new way of thinking for her._
   - _Fixing the engine turned into a whole other ordeal._
4. Retaining all its natural constituents, with none removed, as with whole milk or whole grain.
   - Simple: Having all its natural parts still in it, with nothing taken out, like whole milk.
   - _She switched from skim to whole milk because she missed the creamy taste._
   - _Nutritionists often recommend whole foods over heavily processed ones._
6. Sound and uninjured; healthy and free of damage.
   - Simple: Healthy and not hurt or damaged.
   - _The doctors worked through the night to make the patient whole._
   - _Years after the accident, she no longer felt entirely whole._

## Noun

3. The entirety of something, or a complete thing made up of all its parts, considered as a single unit.
   - Simple: All of something, or a complete thing with all its parts taken together as one.
   - _We need to judge the proposal as a whole, not piece by piece._
   - _The whole of her savings went toward the new house._

## Adverb

5. Entirely; in one complete and undivided piece.
   - Simple: Completely, in one single piece.
   - _The crowd swallowed the rumor whole, asking no questions._
   - _The heron caught the frog and swallowed it whole._

## Other meanings

- (adjective) Still unworked, as of ground, coal, or mineral deposits not yet excavated.

## Origin

Old English hāl ("healthy, safe") became Middle English hol or hole ("healthy, unhurt, whole"), and the line runs back through Proto-Germanic *hailaz to a Proto-Indo-European root meaning "healthy, whole." The wh- spelling arrived in the 15th century and reflected an extra /w/ sound in speech that never took hold in standard English. Hale, health, heal and holy are related words.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/whole (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).