Definitions

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

  • noun An overflowing of water onto land that is normally dry.
  • noun A flood tide.
  • noun A large amount or number, especially when moving from one place to another: synonym: flow.
  • noun A floodlight, specifically a unit that produces a beam of intense light.
  • noun In the Bible, the covering of the earth with water that occurred during the time of Noah.
  • intransitive verb To cover or submerge with water; inundate.
  • intransitive verb To move into or fill in large numbers or amounts.
  • intransitive verb To overwhelm in large numbers.
  • intransitive verb To put too much fuel into the carburetor of (an engine), resulting in unsuccessful ignition.
  • intransitive verb To become inundated or submerged.
  • intransitive verb To pour forth; overflow.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A large, broad body of water; main tide.
  • noun The main ocean; main sea.
  • To overflow; inundate; deluge, literally or figuratively: as, to flood a building or a mine in order to extinguish a fire; to flood a meadow.
  • To be poured out abundantly; rise in a flood.
  • To have an excessive menstrual discharge; also, to bleed profusely after parturition; suffer post-partum hemorrhage; flow, as a lying-in woman.
  • See splash, 4.
  • noun Flowing water; a stream, especially a great stream; a river.
  • noun A great body of water; the sea.
  • noun A great body of moving water, rising, swelling, and overflowing land not usually covered with water; a deluge; an inundation.
  • noun The inflow of the tide; the semidiurnal rise or swell of water in the ocean: opposed to ebb.
  • noun A great body or stream of any fluid or fluidlike substance; anything resembling such a stream: as, a flood of lava; a flood of light.
  • noun Hence A great quantity; an overflowing abundance; a superabundance.
  • noun The menstrual discharge when excessive.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To overflow; to inundate; to deluge.
  • transitive verb To cause or permit to be inundated; to fill or cover with water or other fluid; ; to fill to excess or to its full capacity.
  • noun A great flow of water; a body of moving water; the flowing stream, as of a river; especially, a body of water, rising, swelling, and overflowing land not usually thus covered; a deluge; a freshet; an inundation.
  • noun The flowing in of the tide; the semidiurnal swell or rise of water in the ocean; -- opposed to ebb
  • noun A great flow or stream of any fluid substance; ; hence, a great quantity widely diffused; an overflowing; a superabundance
  • noun Menstrual disharge; menses.
  • noun (Naut.) , the anchor by which a ship is held while the tide is rising.
  • noun a fence so secured that it will not be swept away by a flood.
  • noun a gate for shutting out, admitting, or releasing, a body of water; a tide gate.
  • noun the mark or line to which the tide, or a flood, rises; high-water mark.
  • noun the rising tide; -- opposed to ebb tide.
  • noun the deluge in the days of Noah.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A (usually disastrous) overflow of water from a lake or other body of water due to excessive rainfall or other input of water.
  • noun figuratively A large number or quantity of anything appearing more rapidly than can easily be dealt with.
  • noun A floodlight
  • verb To overflow.
  • verb To cover or partly fill as if by a flood.
  • verb figuratively To provide (someone or something) with a larger number or quantity of something than cannot easily be dealt with.
  • verb Internet, computing To paste numerous lines of text to a chat system in order to disrupt the conversation.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a large flow
  • noun the rising of a body of water and its overflowing onto normally dry land
  • verb supply with an excess of
  • noun the act of flooding; filling to overflowing
  • verb fill quickly beyond capacity; as with a liquid
  • verb become filled to overflowing
  • verb cover with liquid, usually water

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English flod, from Old English flōd; see pleu- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Middle English flod, from Old English flōd, from common Germanic *flōduz, from Proto-Indo-European *plō-tu-, derived from *pleu- "to flow". Near cognates include German Flut and Gothic (flōdus).

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Examples

  • The latin flood is going to increase in the long run not controlled or reduced.

    Matthew Yglesias » Principals Unions 2007

  • Ah, but Rathin Mullick, stop, you must not use the word flood in this house, a bad word, a disastrous word!

    An Atlas of Impossible Longing Anuradha Roy 2008

  • Reversing a lower court decision, the Supreme Court upheld the policy exception according to the ordinary usage of the term flood and accordingly reduced Sher's award to recovery for damage from wind, lost rent, and other losses sustained during Katrina.

    Archive 2008-04-01 2008

  • Sher argued that the term flood was ambiguous, insofar as it might be limited to strictly "natural" events, as opposed to all instances of damage by water.

    A Louisiana decision on flood damage 2008

  • Ah, but Rathin Mullick, stop, you must not use the word flood in this house, a bad word, a disastrous word!

    An Atlas of Impossible Longing Anuradha Roy 2008

  • Sher argued that the term flood was ambiguous, insofar as it might be limited to strictly "natural" events, as opposed to all instances of damage by water.

    Archive 2008-04-01 2008

  • Ah, but Rathin Mullick, stop, you must not use the word flood in this house, a bad word, a disastrous word!

    An Atlas of Impossible Longing Anuradha Roy 2008

  • Reversing a lower court decision, the Supreme Court upheld the policy exception according to the ordinary usage of the term flood and accordingly reduced Sher's award to recovery for damage from wind, lost rent, and other losses sustained during Katrina.

    A Louisiana decision on flood damage 2008

  • When you begin taking the term flood, if you try to (unintelligible) it so many ways as the insurance companies have, it's going to be ambiguous.

    Defining "Flood," with Billions at Stake 2007

  • This demonstration was partly about non-payment of their EU subsidies but the farmers were also demanding the government protect them from what they call a flood of cheap imports.

    The peasants are revolting Richard 2005

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