Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A place where refuse is washed from gold.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • In the afternoon we walked a little way up and down the stream, and saw some gold-washing on a homeopathic scale.

    The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton 2006

  • The wages of free laborers, when employed in such work as gold-washing, agriculture, or digging coal, is 2 yards of unbleached calico per day.

    Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa 2004

  • When the slave-trade began, it seemed to many of the merchants a more speedy mode of becoming rich to sell off the slaves than to pursue the slow mode of gold-washing and agriculture, and they continued to export them until they had neither hands to labor nor to fight for them.

    Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa 2004

  • When the rivers in the district of Manica and other gold-washing places have been flooded, they leave a coating of mud on the banks.

    Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa 2004

  • I said but little of my desire to "go through the motions" of gold-washing, until one day, when, as I passed a deep hole in which several men were at work, my companion requested the owner to fill a small pan, which I had in my hand, with dirt from the bed-rock.

    The Shirley Letters from California Mines in 1851-52 Louise Amelia Knapp Smith Clappe

  • But the thing that sent the skipper outside on the run was the sight of a heap of gold-washing implements piled in a corner and bearing no evidence of more than very casual usage.

    Gold Out of Celebes Aylward Edward Dingle

  • The cascarilleros explained this appearance as due to former arrangements for gold-washing in an old river-bed, the San

    Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Volume 11, No. 23, February, 1873 Various

  • It is recorded that in the year 1572 Captain Juan Salcedo (Legaspi's grandson) went to inspect the mines of Paracale, (Camarines); and in the same district the village of Mambulao has long enjoyed fame for the gold-washing in its vicinity.

    The Philippine Islands John Foreman

  • Krasnoyayk, the capital, stands in a plain in the centre of the district, where the mania of gold-washing broke out about fifteen years ago.

    Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 380, June, 1847 Various

  • Apparently, gold-washing had not been carried on for a very long time, as although the main building still has a roof, the whole place has a very deserted look about it; but, nevertheless, it still affords a covering for weary travellers like ourselves, and we soon began to select the most comfortable looking corners for our beds.

    Argentina from a British Point of View Various

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