one

Signal flag for the digit 1

• One, ONE

Borrowed from English one.

• IPA^(key): [ˈwan]^[1]

one

1. (international standards) NATO & ICAO radiotelephony clear code (spelling-alphabet name) for the digit 1.

   Synonym: unaone (ITU/IMO)

• wone, o (both obsolete)
• (Arabic numeral): 1 (see for numerical forms in other scripts)
• (Roman numeral): I

From Middle English oon, on, oan, an, from Old English ān (“one”), from Proto-West Germanic *ain, from Proto-Germanic *ainaz (“one”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁óynos (“single, one”).

Cognate with Scots ae, ane, wan, yin (“one”); North Frisian ån (“one”); Saterland Frisian aan (“one”); West Frisian ien (“one”); Dutch een, één (“one”); German Low German een; German ein, eins (“one”); Danish en (“one”); Swedish en (“one”); Norwegian Nynorsk ein (“one”), Icelandic einn (“one”); Latin ūnus (“one”) (Old Latin oinos); Russian оди́н (odín), Spanish uno. Doublet of a, an, and Uno.

The use as an indefinite personal pronoun may have been influenced by unrelated French on,^[1] although the Germanic languages widely use cognates for the same sense (usually in non-subject function, but also in subject function, e.g. Luxembourgish een).

Verb form from Middle English onen.

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /wʌn/
• (General Australian) IPA^(key): /wan/, [wän]

  • Audio (General Australian):

    (file)

  • Homophone: won (Etymology 1)
• (UK) IPA^(key): /wɒn/, /wʌn/
  • Rhymes: -ɒn
  • Homophone: won (Etymologies 2 and 3)
• (US) enPR: wŭn, IPA^(key): /wʌn/, [wən]

  • Audio (US):

    (file)

  • Audio (US):

    (file)

  • Rhymes: -ʌn, -ɒn
  • Homophones: wan, won (Etymology 1)
• (obsolete) enPR: ōn, IPA^(key): /oʊn/; (Early Modern) IPA^(key): /ɔːn/

Around the 14th century, in southwest and western England, the word began to be pronounced with an initial /w/^[1][2] (compare e.g. woak, Middle English wocke, a dialectal form of oak),^[3] and the spellings won and wone began to be found alongside on, one;^[4] the /w/, though initially nonstandard, had become the norm by the 18th century.^[1] In alone, atone, and only,^[2] as well as in the dialectal form un, 'un^[1] (and in none and no),^[5] the older pronunciations without /w/ are preserved,^[1][2] while once shows the same /w/.

one

1. The number represented by the Arabic numeral 1; the numerical value equal to that cardinal number.

   In some religions, there is only one god.

   In many cultures, a baby turns one year old a year after its birth.

   One person, one vote.

   • 1912 January, Zane Grey, chapter 8, in Riders of the Purple Sage […], New York, N.Y., London: Harper & Brothers Publishers, →OCLC:

     Venters began to count them—one—two—three—four—on up to sixteen.

   • 1968, Harry Nilsson (lyrics and music), “One”, in Aerial Ballet:

     One is the loneliest number that you'll ever do / Two can be as bad as one / It's the loneliest number since the number one

2. (number theory) The first positive number in the set of natural numbers.
3. (set theory) The cardinality of the smallest nonempty set.
4. (mathematics) The ordinality of an element which has no predecessor, usually called first or number one.

• yan, yen (Northumbria, Cumbria)

• first (ordinal)
• none
• once
• onesome

• Bahamian Creole: wan
• Belizean Creole: wan
• Bislama: wan
• Gullah: one
• Jamaican Creole: wan
• Nigerian Pidgin: wọ́n, wọn
• Sranan Tongo: wan
• Tok Pisin: wan
• → Atong (India): wan
• → Fanagalo: wan

one (reflexive oneself, possessive adjective one’s, plural ones)

1. (impersonal pronoun, indefinite) One thing (among a group of others); one member of a group.

   Any one of the boys.  The big one looks good.  I want the green one.  Every one of the bank’s employees.  A good driver is one who drives carefully.

   • 1609, William Shakespeare, “Sonnet 6”, in Shake-speares Sonnets. […], London: By G[eorge] Eld for T[homas] T[horpe] and are to be sold by William Aspley, →OCLC:

     Which happies thoſe that pay the willing lone; / That's for thy ſelfe to breed an other thee / Or ten times happier be it ten for one, […]

2. (impersonal pronoun, sometimes with "the") The first mentioned of two things or people, as opposed to the other.

   She offered him an apple and an orange; he took one and left the other.

   • 1699, William Temple, Heads designed for an essay on conversations‎^[2]:

     Study gives strength to the mind; conversation, grace: the first apt to give stiffness, the other suppleness: one gives substance and form to the statue, the other polishes it.

4. (indefinite personal pronoun) Any person (applying to people in general).

   Synonym: generic you

   One’s guilt may trouble one, but it is best not to let oneself be troubled by things which cannot be changed.  One shouldn’t be too quick to judge.

   • 1879, R[ichard] J[efferies], chapter 1, in The Amateur Poacher, London: Smith, Elder, & Co., […], →OCLC:

     It was not far from the house; but the ground sank into a depression there, and the ridge of it behind shut out everything except just the roof of the tallest hayrick. As one sat on the sward behind the elm, with the back turned on the rick and nothing in front but the tall elms and the oaks in the other hedge, it was quite easy to fancy it the verge of the prairie with the backwoods close by.

   • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter II, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:

     She was a fat, round little woman, richly apparelled in velvet and lace, […]; and the way she laughed, cackling like a hen, the way she talked to the waiters and the maid, […] — all these unexpected phenomena impelled one to hysterical mirth, and made one class her with such immortally ludicrous types as Ally Sloper, the Widow Twankey, or Miss Moucher.

   • 1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 5, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC:

     ‘It's rather like a beautiful Inverness cloak one has inherited. Much too good to hide away, so one wears it instead of an overcoat and pretends it's an amusing new fashion.’

   • 1992, Rudolf M[athias] Schuster, The Hepaticae and Anthocerotae of North America: East of the Hundredth Meridian, volume V, Chicago, Ill.: Field Museum of Natural History, →ISBN, page vii:

     With fresh material, taxonomic conclusions are leavened by recognition that the material examined reflects the site it occupied; a herbarium packet gives one only a small fraction of the data desirable for sound conclusions. Herbarium material does not, indeed, allow one to extrapolate safely: what you see is what you get […].

   • 2013 September 6, Philip Hoare, “If we're all Martians, who are the aliens?”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 13, page 48:

     One has to admire the sheer optimism of modern science: I love the fact that there is such a discipline as astrobiology, whose practitioners' task is to imagine what life might be like on other planets. Yet here on the home planet we have profoundly strange aliens of our own.

5. (pronoun) Any person, entity or thing.

   "driver", noun: one who drives.

• See they § Usage notes.

• (unidentified person): you, they (in nominative personal case)

one (plural ones)

1. The digit or figure 1.
2. (by ellipsis) Used to briefly refer to a noun phrase understood by context
   1. (US) A one-dollar bill.

      I need some ones to make change.

   2. One o'clock, either a.m. or p.m.
      • 1816 June – 1817 April/May (date written), [Mary Shelley], chapter 5, in Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus. […], volume I, London: […] [Macdonald and Son] for Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor, & Jones, published 1 January 1818, →OCLC, page 97:

        It was already one in the morning; the rain pattered dismally against the panes, and my candle was nearly burnt out, when, by the glimmer of the half-extinguished light, I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open; it breathed hard, and a convulsive motion agitated its limbs.

      • 1853 September 17, “Metropolitan Hospitals & Medical Schools”, in The Lancet, volume 62, number 1568, →DOI, page 268:

        The ophthalmic surgeon attends Tuesdays and Saturdays, at half-past one.

      • 1925 July – 1926 May, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, “In which Three Investigators Come across a Dark Soul”, in The Land of Mist (eBook no. 0601351h.html), Australia: Project Gutenberg Australia, published April 2019:

        It was a weary time. A carriage clock had been placed on the discoloured wooden mantelpiece, and slowly its hands crept on from one to two and from two to three.

   3. (cricket) One run scored by hitting the ball and running between the wickets; a single.
   4. A joke or amusing anecdote.

      Did you hear the one about the agnostic dyslexic insomniac?

3. (followed by for) A person (having some specified characteristic or attribute).
   • 1905, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, Kipps: The Story of a Simple Soul, London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, page 55:

     Pause. They look meaningly at one another. / "You are a one for being roundabout," says the lady.

4. (colloquial) A particularly special or compatible person or thing.

   I knew as soon I met him that John was the one for me and we were married within a month.

   That car's the one — I'll buy it.

   • 1995, Bryan Adams, Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman?:

     When you love a woman then tell her / that she's really wanted / When you love a woman then tell her that she's the one / 'cause she needs somebody to tell her / that it's gonna last forever

5. (dated, euphemistic or derogatory) A gay person.
   • 1933 March 25, Dorothy Parker, “The Diary of a Lady”, in The New Yorker‎^[3], page 13:

     Finally got Ollie Martin. He couldn't have more poise, and what do I care if he is one?

6. (mathematics) The identity element with respect to multiplication in a ring.
7. (Internet slang, leetspeak, sarcastic) Deliberate misspelling of !. Used to amplify an exclamation, parodying unskilled typists who forget to press the shift key while typing exclamation points, thus typing "1".

   A: SUM1 Hl3p ME im alwyz L0ziN!1!?1!

   Someone help me; I'm always losing!?

   B: y d0nt u just g0 away l0zer!!1!!one!!one!!eleven!!1!

   Why don't you just go away loser!

   • 2003 September 26, "DEAL WITH IT!!!!11one!!", in alt.games.video.nintendo.gamecube, Usenet
   • 2004 November 9, "AWK sound recorder!!!11!!11one", in comp.lang.awk, Usenet
   • 2007 December 1, "STANFORD!!1!!1!one!11!!1oneone!1!1!", in rec.sport.football.college, Usenet

• (mathematics: multiplicative identity): unity
• (US: one-dollar bill): single
• (sarcastic substitution for !): 1, eleven

one (not comparable)

1. Of a period of time, being particular.

   One day the prince set forth to kill the dragon that had brought terror to his father’s kingdom for centuries.

   • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter IV, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:

     One morning I had been driven to the precarious refuge afforded by the steps of the inn, after rejecting offers from the Celebrity to join him in a variety of amusements. But even here I was not free from interruption, for he was seated on a horse-block below me, playing with a fox terrier.

2. Being a single, unspecified thing; a; any.

   My aunt used to say, "One day is just like the other."

3. Sole, only.

   He is the one man who can help you.

   The one male audience member at the concert is invited on stage.

4. Whole, entire.

   Body and soul are not separate; they are one.

5. In agreement.

   We are one on the importance of learning.

6. The same.

   The two types look very different, but are one species.

one

1. A single.

   Antonyms: zero, no; a few, a couple of, a handful of, several; multiple, various; many, numerous; countless

   Hypernyms: any, some

   There was one box of biscuits available.

2. Used for emphasis in place of a
   1. Being a preeminent example.

      He is one hell of a guy.

   2. Being an unknown person with the specified name; see also "a certain".

      The town records from 1843 showed the overnight incarceration of one “A. Lincoln”.

one (third-person singular simple present ones, present participle oning, simple past and past participle oned)

1. (transitive) To cause to become one; to gather into a single whole; to unite.
   • 1994, Christopher Nugent, Mysticism, Death and Dying, page 55:

     The question, of course, evokes discernment, not dogma, but we should note that the "unknowing" involves intellectual knowledge, whereas the problematic of being "oned" involves experiential knowledge.

   • 2000, Carolyn Baker, The Journey of Forgiveness: Fulfilling the Healing Process, page 145:

     And both shall be oned in eternal happiness.

   • 2003, Elizabeth MacKinlay, Mental Health and Spirituality in Later Life, page 83:

     Knit and oned to God human beings are irrevocably in relationship with the divine.

   • 2019, David Grieve, Love in Thin Places: Confessions of a Cathedral Chaplain, page 43:

     What might be if we were Oned? United, as we would say, but at a greater depth than being a season ticket holder in a football club, or a shareholder in some conglomerate.

• Table of cardinal numbers 0 to 9 in various languages

• “one”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
•   one on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Analogous to several senses of Hokkien ê and Mandarin 的 (de, declarative particle, nominalizer, etc.). This semantic loan might have stemmed from the apparent similarity between one as a prop-word and 的/-ê as a nominalizer (e.g. 青色的 (“the green one”)). Compare Cantonese 嘅 (ge³).

• (Singapore) IPA^(key): /wʌn/, [wän˦], (at the end of sentences) [wän˦˧]

one (Singapore, Singlish)

1. Used at the end of a sentence to highlight the characteristics of someone or something.

   Got almonds one. ― There are almonds in it.

   How come so heavy one ah? ― Why is it so heavy?

   Can easily get lost one, know? ― You can easily get lost here/there.

   • 2000 February 14, Patricia Mok, The Straits Times (Life! section), Singapore: Singapore Press Holdings, →OCLC, page 5:

     'My boyfriends very possessive one. They don't allow me to wear clothes I want, do things I want,' she laments.

   • 2004, Ethical Egoist, soc.culture.singapore (Usenet):

     Why so special one?

3. Used at the end of a sentence to highlight the originator of something.

   My friend send one. ― It was sent by my friend.

   Who say one? ― Who said so?

   He ask one, not I ask one. ― It wasn’t me who asked, it was him.

   • 2011, Singrish King, soc.culture.singapore (Usenet):

     ooooooooooar! you own self admit one har! i never say one har!

4. A nominalizer used to form a noun phrase without a head noun.

   The sell fruits one go home already. ― The fruit seller went home.

Sense 2 takes the place of the direct object at the end of sentences.

one

1. (Singapore, Singlish, rare) Used as a relative pronoun at the end of a relative clause.

• (Singlish and Manglish particles): ah, hor, know, lah, leh, liao, lor, mah, meh, sia, what

• Jock Wong (2005) “‘Why You so Singlish One?’ A Semantic and Cultural Interpretation of the Singapore English Particle One”, in Language in Society, volume 34, number 2, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press, →DOI, →ISSN, →OCLC, pages 239–275.
• Chow Siew Yeng, Francis Bond (2022 June) “Singlish Where Got Rules One? Constructing a Computational Grammar for Singlish”, in Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation‎^[4], Paris: European Language Resources Association, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2024-07-18, pages 5243–5250.

• EON, NEO, NOE, Neo, Noe, eno-, eon, neo, neo-

one

1. to hunt

• Ross, M. & Næss, Å. (2007) “An Oceanic origin for Äiwoo, the language of the Reef Islands?”, in Oceanic Linguistics, volume 46, number 2. Cited in: "Äiwoo" in Greenhill, S.J., Blust, R., & Gray, R.D. (2008). The Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database: From Bioinformatics to Lexomics. Evolutionary Bioinformatics, 4:271–283.

From Proto-Polynesian *qone, from Proto-Austronesian *qənay.

• IPA^(key): /ˈo.ne/

one

1. sand

one

1. Rōmaji transcription of おね

one

1. water

• Anales: Sección historico-filosófica (Museo de Historia Natural de Montevideo), volume 1 (2), part 1

From Proto-Polynesian *qone, from Proto-Austronesian *qənay.

one

1. sand

From Proto-Polynesian *qone, from Proto-Austronesian *qənay.

one

1. beach
2. sand, mud
3. soil, earth

one

1. Alternative form of on

one

1. Alternative form of on (“on”)

one

1. Alternative form of on

one

1. Alternative form of on (“singly”)

one (uncountable)

1. Alternative form of hone (“delay”)

one (third-person singular simple present oneth, present participle onende, onynge, first-/third-person singular past indicative and past participle oned)

1. Alternative form of onen

one (third-person singular simple present an, present participle onende, first-/third-person singular past indicative oðe, past participle onen)

1. (Early Middle English) Alternative form of unnen

one (uncountable)

1. Alternative form of wone (“course”)

one (plural ones)

1. Alternative form of oven

one

1. Alternative form of owen

From Proto-Polynesian *qone, from Proto-Austronesian *qənay.

one

1. sand
2. gunpowder

From Proto-Germanic *ēnu (“without”). Cognates include Old Saxon āno and Old Dutch *āna.

• IPA^(key): /ˈɔːne/

ône

1. except

• Bremmer, Rolf H. (2009) An Introduction to Old Frisian: History, Grammar, Reader, Glossary, Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company, →ISBN

Inherited from Old Polish one. The oblique case forms come from Proto-Slavic *ję̇.

• IPA^(key): /ˈɔ.nɛ/

• Audio 1:

  (file)

• Audio 2:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔnɛ
• Syllabification: o‧ne

one nvir

1. they; nonvirile third-person plural pronoun, used for all groups not containing men

• Appendix:Polish pronouns

• one in Polish dictionaries at PWN

From Proto-Polynesian *qone, from Proto-Austronesian *qənay.

one

1. sand

From Proto-Polynesian *qone, from Proto-Austronesian *qənay.

one

1. sand

Inherited from Proto-Slavic *ony, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁ónos.

• IPA^(key): /ǒne/
• Hyphenation: o‧ne

òne (Cyrillic spelling о̀не)

1. they (nominative plural of òna (“she”)); nonvirile third-person plural pronoun, used for all groups not containing men
2. masculine plural accusative of onaj

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

• IPA^(key): /ɔ̀ːnɛ/

óne

1. they (feminine plural, more than two)

Forms between parentheses indicate clitic forms; the main forms are used for emphasis.

From Proto-Polynesian *qone, from Proto-Austronesian *qənay.

• IPA^(key): /ˈɔ.ne/

one

1. sand
2. dust

• “one” in Dictionnaire en ligne Tahitien/Français (Online Tahitian–French Dictionary), by the Tahitian Academy.

From Proto-Polynesian *qone, from Proto-Austronesian *qənay.

one

1. sand

 

 

From Proto-Polynesian *qone (“sand”). Cognates include Hawaiian one and Samoan one.

• IPA^(key): [ˈo.ne]
• Hyphenation: o‧ne

one

1. beach of sand
2. gunpowder

• oneone

• R. Simona, editor (1986), Tokelau Dictionary‎^[5], Auckland: Office of Tokelau Affairs, page 38

From Proto-Polynesian *qone, from Proto-Austronesian *qənay.

one

1. sand

one

1. (dative singular of on) to it