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pile1

Pronunciation: /pʌɪl/
Translate pile | into French | into German | into Italian | into Spanish
Definition of pile

noun

  • 1a heap of things laid or lying one on top of another:he placed the books in a neat pile tottering piles of dirty dishes
  • informal a large amount of something:he’s making piles of money
  • archaic a funeral pyre.
  • 2a large imposing building or group of buildings:a Victorian Gothic pile
  • 3a series of plates of dissimilar metals laid one on another alternately to produce an electric current.
  • 4 (also atomic pile) dated a nuclear reactor.

verb

  • 1 [with object and adverbial] place (things) one on top of the other:she piled all the groceries on the counter
  • (be piled with) be stacked or loaded with:his in tray was piled high with papers
  • (pile up/pile something up) increase or cause to increase in quantity: [no object]:the work is piling up
  • (pile something on) informal intensify or exaggerate something for effect:you can pile on the guilt but my heart has turned to stone
  • 2 [no object] (pile into/out of) (of a group of people) get into or out of (a vehicle) in a disorganized manner:ten of us piled into the minibus
  • (pile into) (of a vehicle) crash into:60 cars piled into each other on the M62

Phrases

make a (or one's) pile

informal make a lot of money: he was a car salesman who had made his pile in the Thatcher years

pile arms

place a number of rifles (usually four) with their butts on the ground and the muzzles together.

pile it on

informal exaggerate the seriousness of a situation for effect.

Origin:

late Middle English: from Old French, from Latin pila 'pillar, pier'

pile in other Oxford dictionaries

Definition of pile in the US English dictionary

Nearby words

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