pole
n. countablen. a long, thin piece of wood, metal, or plastic. You often see them used to hold things up, like flags or power lines.
n. a long, slender, rounded piece of wood, metal, or other resilient material. Often used as a structural support, a tool for propulsion, or a marker of a specific geographic or magnetic point.
The flag hangs from a tall silver pole.
The electrician used a long fiberglass pole to reach the wires at the top of the street lamp.
The explorers struggled to plant their markers in the frozen ground, eventually securing a sturdy pole to signal their arrival at the geographic center of the plateau.
From Middle English pole, pal, from Old English pāl (“a pole, stake, post; a kind of hoe or spade”), from Proto-West Germanic pāl (“pole”), from Latin pālus (“stake, pale, prop, stay”), perhaps from Old Latin paxlos, from Proto-Italic pākslos, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European peh₂ǵ- (“to nail, fasten”). Doublet of peel, pale, and palus. Cognates Cognate with Scots pale, paill (“stake, pale”), North Frisian pul, pil (“stake, pale”), Saterland Frisian Pool (“pole”), West Frisian poal (“pole”), Dutch paal (“pole”), German Pfahl (“pile, stake, post, pole”), Danish pæl (“pole”), Swedish påle (“pole”), Icelandic páll (“hoe, spade, pale”), Old English fæc (“space of time, while, division, interval; lustrum”).
From Middle French pole, pôle, from Latin polus, from Ancient Greek πόλος (pólos, “axis of rotation”).