Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Mineral coal, or coal obtained from mines or pits: distinguished from charcoal.

Etymologies

Sorry, no etymologies found.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word pit-coal.

Examples

  • It was old, it smelt damp, and it was the worst kind of black powder - that made from the dusty leavings of finer powder and adulterated with ground pit-coal, but it was still gunpowder.

    Sharpe's Siege Cornwell, Bernard 1987

  • Fermentation is a subsequent _low combustion_ of the vegetable oxydes or grain, that has undergone a previous, but partial combustion, something like the slightly charring, or oxydating of wood or pit-coal, by which the oxygenation is incomplete in both, and rendered more complete in the former.

    The American Practical Brewer and Tanner Joseph Coppinger

  • I had, however, some amends made me for my trouble; as in searching, I found some marks of pit-coal in the neighbourhood, a thing at least as useful in other parts of the colony as in this.

    History of Louisisana Or of the Western Parts of Virginia and Carolina: Containing -1775 Le Page du Pratz

  • In fine, those high lands to the east of the Missisippi, from Manchae to the river Wabache, may and ought to contain mines: we find in them, just at the surface, iron and pit-coal, but no appearance of silver mines; gold there may be, copper also, and lead.

    History of Louisisana Or of the Western Parts of Virginia and Carolina: Containing -1775 Le Page du Pratz

  • Besides, the steep banks of Prud'homme contain iron and pit-coal.

    History of Louisisana Or of the Western Parts of Virginia and Carolina: Containing -1775 Le Page du Pratz

  • Do ye think I would waste my good pit-coal on the hide o f a brain-sick fool?

    Kipling, The Poet of Empire 1936

  • God, and afterward, horribile dictu, pitchforks for little Margaret, and a vivid incandescent state to be maintained through eternity at vast cost of pit-coal to a gentleman who carried over his arm, so as not to step on it, a long snaky tail with a point like a harpoon's.

    Aladdin O'Brien Gouverneur Morris 1914

  • Coal is found in large quantities on Vancouver Island and in Nova Scotia and even in Manitoba and Saskatchewan; pit-coal in

    The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume 3: Brownson-Clairvaux 1840-1916 1913

  • And it was to little purpose that they had pit-coal, or that looms were improved, unless Watt and Stephenson had taught them to work force-pumps and powerlooms by steam.

    X. English Traits. Wealth 1909

  • They have very good pit-coal in several places of the country, but no man has yet thought it worth his while to make use of it, as he has wood in plenty, which is lying conveniently near him. 188

    Colonial Children 1902

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.