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soil

/sɔɪl/ noun B2
  1. A mixture of mineral particles and organic material, used to support plant growth. (uncountable) · We bought a bag of soil for the houseplants.
  2. The unconsolidated mineral or organic material on the immediate surface of the earth that serves as a natural medium for the growth of land plants. (uncountable)
  3. The unconsolidated mineral or organic matter on the surface of the earth that has been subjected to and shows effects of genetic and environmental factors of: climate (including water and temperature effects), and macro- and microorganisms, conditioned by relief, acting on parent material over a period of time. A product-soil differs from the material from which it is derived in many physical, chemical, biological, and morphological properties and characteristics. (uncountable)
  4. Country or territory. (countable, uncountable)
  5. That which soils or pollutes; a stain. (countable, uncountable)
  6. A marshy or miry place to which a hunted boar resorts for refuge; hence, a wet place, stream, or tract of water, sought for by other game, as deer. (countable, uncountable)
  7. Dung; compost; manure. (countable, uncountable) · night soil
  8. A food preparation with the texture and often color of soil. (countable, uncountable)

Plural soils

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From the library

Few have passed through this revolutionary period, in the midst of which we were born, without some stain of infamy or blood to soil the uniform of the soldier, or the gown of the magistrate.
The Count of Monte Cristo, p. 849 · C1
The blackish soil is kept forever soft by the incessant drift of spray, and a bird would leave its tread upon it.
The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, p. 124 · B2
A few yards from the end the soil was all ploughed up into a patch of mud, and the branches and ferns which fringed the chasm were torn and bedraggled.
The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, p. 124 · B2
If they took him to the cemetery and laid him in a grave, he would allow himself to be covered with earth, and then, as it was night, the grave-diggers could scarcely have turned their backs before he would have worked his way through the yielding soil and escaped.
The Count of Monte Cristo, p. 216 · C1

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Words, meanings, pronunciations and translations from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0); how common each word is from wordfreq. Made into this dictionary by FluentPlex.