Meanings
adjectiveonlest (not comparable)
- USdateddialectalnot comparablepossiblyespecially African-American VernacularOnly.
I'm the onlest father them boys has got.
1 more example
I knowed the onlest thing to get her cured was to get a bucket of ice water, […]
c. 1850-1970, Scott Dunbar, quoted in 2009 by William R. Ferris in Give My Poor Heart Ease: Voices of the Mississippi Blues →ISBN
Origin
Variant of onliest.
Full word history & related roots →Rhymes & wordplay
Anagrams
Cite this entry
APA
onlest. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/onlest
MLA
“onlest.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/onlest. Accessed November 2, 2026.
Chicago
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “onlest,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/onlest.
Source: onlest on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.