pole

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• noun Either extremity of an axis through a sphere.
• noun Either of the regions contiguous to the extremities of the earth's rotational axis, the North Pole or the South Pole.
• noun Electricity Either of two oppositely charged terminals, as in an electric cell or battery.
• noun Either extremity of the main axis of a nucleus, cell, or organism.
• noun Either end of the spindle formed in a cell during mitosis.
• noun The point on a nerve cell where a process originates.
• noun Either of two antithetical ideas, propensities, forces, or positions.
• noun A fixed point of reference.
• noun The origin in a polar coordinate system; the vertex of a polar angle.
• noun A point in the complex plane at which a given function is not defined.
• noun A long, relatively slender, generally rounded piece of wood or other material.
• noun The long tapering wooden shaft extending up from the front axle of a vehicle to the collars of the animals drawing it; a tongue.
• noun A unit of area equal to a square rod.
• noun Sports The inside position on the starting line of a racetrack.
• intransitive verb To propel with a pole.
• intransitive verb To propel (oneself) or make (one's way) by the use of ski poles.
• intransitive verb To support (plants) with a pole.
• intransitive verb To strike, poke, or stir with a pole.
• intransitive verb To propel a boat or raft with a pole.
• intransitive verb To use ski poles to maintain or gain speed.

from The Century Dictionary.

• To furnish with poles for support: as, to pole beans.
• To bear or convey on poles.
• To impel by means of a pole, as a boat; push forward by the use of poles.
• In copper-refining, to stir with a pole.
• To use a pole; push or impel a boat with a pole.
• noun A native or an inhabitant of Poland, a former kingdom of Europe, divided, since the latter part of the eighteenth century, between Russia, Prussia, and Austria.
• An obsolete spelling of poll.
• noun An obsolete spelling of pool.
• noun A long, slender, tapering piece of wood, such as the trunk of a tree of any size, from which the branches have been cut; a piece of wood (or metal) of much greater length than thickness, especially when more or less rounded and tapering.
• noun Specifically— A rod used in measuring.
• noun In a two-horse vehicle, a long tapering piece of wood, forming the shaft or tongue, carrying the neck-yoke or the pole-straps, and sometimes the whiffletrees, by means of which the carriage is drawn.
• noun A fishing-rod.
• noun A bean-pole or hop-pole.
• noun A ship's mast.
• noun A perch or rod, a measure of length containing 16½ feet or 5½ yards; also, a measure of surface, a square pole denoting 5½ × 5½ yards, or 30¼ square yards.
• noun A flatfish, Pleuronectes or Glyptocephalus cynoglossus, also called pole-dab.
• noun That part of the sperm-whale's lower jaw which holds the teeth. See pan, 12.
• noun The tall, erect, flowering stem sent up by the species of Agave (century-plant) when about to complete their life-cycle, particularly that of the sisal hemp, Agave rigida, cultivated for its fiber in Yucatan, Florida, etc. Plants at the pole-bearing stage are said to be in pole. Plantlets are formed on the branches of the inflorescence which serve for propagation, and are known as pole-plants.
• noun In forestry, a tree from 4 to 12 inches in diameter breast-high. See tree class. A small or low pole is a tree from 4 to 8 inches in diameter breast-high; a large or high pole, one from 8 to 12 inches in diameter breast-high. Also called high pole.
• noun In archery, a case of canvas, or other material, to carry bows from place to place.
• noun A device for steadying a cross-cut saw, so that one man can use it, instead of two.
• noun In mathematics: The cointersection point of the joins when two correlated polystigms have the joins of their paired dots and codots copunctal.