PILE, n. [L. pila.]

1. A heap; a mass or collection of things in a roundish or elevated form; as, a pile of stones; a pile of bricks; a pile of wood or timber; a pile of ruins.
2. A collection of combustibles for burning a dead body; as, a funeral pile.
3. A large building or mass of buildings; an edifice. The pile o'erlook'd the town and drew the sight. – Dryden.
4. A heap of balls or shot laid in horizontal courses, rising into a pyramidical form.

1. A large stake or piece of timber, pointed and driven into the earth, as at the bottom of a river, or in a harbor where the ground is soft, for the support of a building or other superstructure. The stadthouse Amsterdam is supported by piles.
2. One side of a coin; originally, a punch or puncheon used in stamping figures on coins, and containing the figures to be impressed. Hence the arms-side of a coin is called the pile, and the head the cross, which was formerly in the place of the head. Hence cross and pile. – Encyc.
3. In heraldry, [one of the lesser ordinaries, resembling a pile used in laying the foundations of buildings in watery places, whence it has its name. – E. H. B.]

The head of an arrow.

Properly, a hair; hence, the fiber of wool, cotton and the like; hence, the nap, the fine hairy substance of the surface of cloth.

1. To lay or throw into a heap; to collect many things into a mass, as, to pile wood or stones.
2. To bring into an aggregate; to accumulate; as, to pile quotations or comments. – Atterbury. Felton.
3. To fill with something heaped. – Abbot.
4. To fill above the brim or top.
5. To break off the awns of threshed barley. [Local.]
6. To drive piles. Sheet pile, to drive a piling of planks edge to edge. Whence the noun sheet-piling.

1. A hair; hence, the fiber of wool, cotton, and the like; also, the nap when thick or heavy, as of carpeting and velvet.
   
   

   Velvet soft, or plush with shaggy pile. Cowper.

2. The head of an arrow or spear.
   
   
   [Obs.] Chapman.
3. A large stake, or piece of timber, pointed and driven into the earth, as at the bottom of a river, or in a harbor where the ground is soft, for the support of a building, a pier, or other superstructure, or to form a cofferdam, etc.
   
   

   * Tubular iron piles are now much used.

4. To drive piles into; to fill with piles; to strengthen with piles.
   
   

   To sheet-pile, to make sheet piling in or around. See Sheet piling, under 2nd Piling.

5. A mass of things heaped together; a heap; as, a pile of stones; a pile of wood.
6. To lay or throw into a pile or heap] to heap up; to collect into a mass; to accumulate; to amass; -- often with up; as, to pile up wood.
   
   
   "Hills piled on hills." Dryden. "Life piled on life." Tennyson.

   The labor of an age in piled stones. Milton.

7. A covering of hair or fur.
8. One of the ordinaries or subordinaries having the form of a wedge, usually placed palewise, with the broadest end uppermost.
   
   

   Pile bridge, a bridge of which the roadway is supported on piles. -- Pile cap, a beam resting upon and connecting the heads of piles. -- Pile driver, or Pile engine, an apparatus for driving down piles, consisting usually of a high frame, with suitable appliances for raising to a height (by animal or steam power, the explosion of gunpowder, etc.) a heavy mass of iron, which falls upon the pile. -- Pile dwelling. See Lake dwelling, under Lake. -- Pile plank (Hydraul. Eng.), a thick plank used as a pile in sheet piling. See Sheet piling, under Piling. -- Pneumatic pile. See under Pneumatic. -- Screw pile, one with a screw at the lower end, and sunk by rotation aided by pressure.

9. A mass formed in layers; as, a pile of shot.
10. To cover with heaps; or in great abundance; to fill or overfill; to load.
    
    

    To pile arms or muskets (Mil.), to place three guns together so that they may stand upright, supporting each other; to stack arms.

11. A funeral pile; a pyre.
    
    
    Dryden.
12. A large building, or mass of buildings.
    
    

    The pile o'erlooked the town and drew the fight. Dryden.

13. Same as Fagot, n., 2.
14. A vertical series of alternate disks of two dissimilar metals, as copper and zinc, laid up with disks of cloth or paper moistened with acid water between them, for producing a current of electricity; -- commonly called Volta's pile, voltaic pile, or galvanic pile.
    
    

    * The term is sometimes applied to other forms of apparatus designed to produce a current of electricity, or as synonymous with battery; as, for instance, to an apparatus for generating a current of electricity by the action of heat, usually called a thermopile.

15. The reverse of a coin. See Reverse.
    
    

    Cross and pile. See under Cross. -- Dry pile. See under Dry.