one and the same
Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.
Meaning · English
Identical or essentially the same
Literally: a single unit
Where it’s used:
Used
Widespread English
Examples
More than one myth can be held ‘ in the mind’ at one and the same time.
My own view is that the fate of working people, the trade unions and the Labour Party are one and the same and that any attempt to weaken links between us condemns us all to the same failure.
British National Corpus sentence via the MAGPIE corpus (CC BY 4.0, retrieved 2026-07-30)
Sources & notes
Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-31; pending editor spot-check.
Equivalents & related
Common questions
What does “one and the same” mean?
Identical or essentially the same Literally: a single unit
Is “one and the same” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.
What is the closest equivalent?
“trước sau như một” (Tiếng Việt) — near equivalent.