Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun An artificial channel for conducting water, with a valve or gate to regulate the flow.
- noun A valve or gate used in such a channel; a floodgate.
- noun A body of water impounded behind a floodgate.
- noun A sluiceway.
- noun A long inclined trough, as for carrying logs or separating gold ore.
- intransitive verb To flood or drench with or as if with a flow of released water.
- intransitive verb To wash with water flowing in a sluice.
- intransitive verb To draw off or let out by a sluice.
- intransitive verb To send (logs, for example) down a sluice.
- intransitive verb To flow out from or as if from a sluice.
from The Century Dictionary.
- To open a flood-gate or sluice upon; let a copious flow of water on or in: as, to
sluice a meadow. - To draw out or off, as water, by a sluice: as, to
sluice the water into the corn-fields or to a mill. - To wet or lave abundantly.
- To scour out or cleanse by means of sluices: as, to
sluice a harbor. - To let out as by a sluice; cause to gush out.
- noun A body of water held in check by a flood-gate; a stream of water issuing through a flood-gate.
- noun A gate or other contrivance by which the flow of water in a waterway is controlled; a flood-gate; also, an artificial passage or channel into which water is allowed to enter by such a gate; a sluiceway; hence, any artificial channel for running water: as, a mill -sluice.
- noun In mining, a trough made of boards, used for separating gold from the gravel and sand in which it occurs.
- noun In steam-engines, the injection-valve by which the water of condensation is introduced into the condenser.
- noun A tubulure or pipe through which water is directed at will.
- In lumbering: Same as
flume , 2. - To float (logs) through the sluiceway of a splash-dam. Same as
splash , 5. - To injure (as a team of horses or their driver) by the down-rush of a load of logs due to the breaking of the hawser used to control its descent over a steep slope.
- noun Same as
flume , 4.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun An artifical passage for water, fitted with a valve or gate, as in a mill stream, for stopping or regulating the flow; also, a water gate or flood gate.
- noun Hence, an opening or channel through which anything flows; a source of supply.
- noun The stream flowing through a flood gate.
- noun (Mining) A long box or trough through which water flows, -- used for washing auriferous earth.
- noun the sliding gate of a sluice.
- transitive verb rare To emit by, or as by, flood gates.
- transitive verb To wet copiously, as by opening a sluice.
- transitive verb To wash with, or in, a stream of water running through a sluice.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun An artificial passage for water, fitted with a valve or gate, as in a mill stream, for stopping or regulating the flow; also, a water gate or flood gate.
- noun Hence, an opening or channel through which anything flows; a source of supply.
- noun The stream flowing through a flood gate.
- noun mining A long box or trough through which water flows, -- used for washing auriferous earth.
- verb rare To emit by, or as by, flood gates. -Milton.
- verb To wet copiously, as by opening a sluice; as, to sluice meadows. Howitt.
- verb To wash with, or in, a stream of water running through a sluice; as, to sluice earth or gold dust in a sluice box in placer mining.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- verb transport in or send down a sluice
- noun conduit that carries a rapid flow of water controlled by a sluicegate
- verb pour as if from a sluice
- verb irrigate with water from a sluice
- verb draw through a sluice
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Call you at half after five in the mornin ', an' you get up an 'take a' sluice '-- if there's any soap.
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SLUICE ROBBER: one way of separating gold from the gravel and sand in which it is found is to put the mixture into a slanting trough, called a sluice, through which water is run.
The Short-story William Patterson Atkinson
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A kind of broad trough, running in a slanting direction and called a sluice, was on one side, and into this a quantity of wash was put, and a tap at the top turned on, which caused the water to wash the dirt down the sluice.
Madame Midas Fergus Hume 1895
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This had what is called a sluice valve, and Lambert had been instructed to turn the screw which closed it round and round, until he found he could turn it no farther; when that was done, he would know that it was shut.
Chatterbox, 1906 Various 1873
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'Tom' begat the sluice, which is of two kinds, natural and artificial.
To The Gold Coast for Gold, Vol. II A Personal Narrative Richard Francis Burton 1855
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"Call you at half after five in the mornin ', an' you get up an 'take a' sluice '-- if there's any soap.
The People of the Abyss Jack London 1896
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And just as the miner makes the broken-down gold-bearing stuff run through his constructed sluices, Nature sends all her gold in a torrent into the natural sluice which is known as the Fraser Canyon.
A Tramp's Notebook Morley Roberts 1899
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All these brilliant images took possession of our fancies as soon as the boy had uttered the unlucky word "sluice;" and smiling to one another, we made up our minds to rest contentedly where we were.
Germany, Bohemia, and Hungary, Visited in 1837. Vol. II 1842
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Searching for a definition for the word "sluice," I naturally turned to my trusty friend,
Traffick 2009
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Searching for a definition for the word "sluice," I naturally turned to my trusty friend,
Traffick 2009
ofravens commented on the word sluice
Plath citations: see note at millrace.
March 26, 2008