soy.
A common East Asian liquid sauce, made by subjecting boiled beans to long fermentation and then long digestion in salt and water.
Meaning & usage
A common East Asian liquid sauce, made by subjecting boiled beans to long fermentation and then long digestion in salt and water.
I like a little soy with my rice.
Soybeans, or the protein derived from them.
These candles are made from soy.
The soy crop is looking good this year.
Where this word comes from
Etymology tree Chinese 醬油 /酱油obor. Japanese 醤油 Japanese そやbor. Dutch sojabor. English soy 1670s; borrowed from Dutch soja, from the Satsuma pronunciation of Japanese 醤油 (soi), variant of the standard Japanese 醤油 (shōyu). Doublet of shoyu, orthographic borrowing from Middle Chinese 醬油 (tsjàng-yuw), from 醬 (tsjangᴴ, “bean paste”) + 油 (“oil”).
Characteristic of a soy boy; weak, unmasculine, etc.
This whole drama is the soyest thing I've ever seen.
Where this word comes from
Etymology tree Chinese 醬油 /酱油obor. Japanese 醤油 Japanese そやbor. Dutch sojabor. English soy 1670s; borrowed from Dutch soja, from the Satsuma pronunciation of Japanese 醤油 (soi), variant of the standard Japanese 醤油 (shōyu). Doublet of shoyu, orthographic borrowing from Middle Chinese 醬油 (tsjàng-yuw), from 醬 (tsjangᴴ, “bean paste”) + 油 (“oil”).
Synonym of soy out (“to act in the manner of a soy boy”).
Where this word comes from
Etymology tree Chinese 醬油 /酱油obor. Japanese 醤油 Japanese そやbor. Dutch sojabor. English soy 1670s; borrowed from Dutch soja, from the Satsuma pronunciation of Japanese 醤油 (soi), variant of the standard Japanese 醤油 (shōyu). Doublet of shoyu, orthographic borrowing from Middle Chinese 醬油 (tsjàng-yuw), from 醬 (tsjangᴴ, “bean paste”) + 油 (“oil”).
Silk.
Where this word comes from
Borrowed from French soie (“silk”), soye, from Middle French soye, from Old French soie, earlier seie, from Latin sēta, saeta, from Proto-Italic *saitā, from Proto-Indo-European *séh₂ito-, *sh₂éyto-, from *sh₂ey-, *seh₂i- (“to bind”). Doublet of seta.
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.