Definitions

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

  • noun A steamship, especially one used on rivers and other inland waterways.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A vessel propelled by steam-power.

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

  • noun A boat or vessel propelled by steam power; -- generally used of river or coasting craft, as distinguished from ocean steamers.

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

  • noun A boat or vessel propelled by steam power.

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

  • noun a boat propelled by a steam engine

Etymologies

Sorry, no etymologies found.

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Examples

  • The term steamboat is usually used to refer to smaller steam-powered boats working on lakes and rivers, particularly riverboats; steamship generally refers to larger steam-powered ships, usually ocean-going, capable of carrying a (ship's) boat.

    WN.com - Articles related to Jollibee ties up with Singapore firm on food manufacture in China 2010

  • He is on white man's fire-boat, what you call steamboat, only he is on boat maybe twenty times bigger than steamboat on Yukon.

    Love of Life and Other Stories Jack London 1896

  • The steamboat is claimed as the “exclusive” discovery of Fulton, Jouffroy, Rumsey, Stevens and Symmington.

    In the Air « Isegoria 2008

  • Silverheaded; but, to my great relief, it turned out that the steamboat is not running.

    Letters and Memorials of Jane Welsh Carlyle 1883

  • White aw black aw octoroom free niggeh, Phyllis gwine to choose de old Hayle home and de great riveh -- full o 'steamboat' -- sooneh'n any lan 'whah de ain't mo'n one 'oman to de mile.

    Gideon's Band A Tale of the Mississippi George Washington Cable 1884

  • Now the steamboat is a paddlewheel-sporting boutique hotel permanently moored at Coolidge Park Landing in downtown Chattanooga, Tenn.

    Anchored, Away 2012

  • This steamboat, which is called the Burlington, is a perfectly exquisite achievement of neatness, elegance, and order.

    American Notes for General Circulation 2007

  • If the river was, as T. S. Eliot later wrote, “a strong brown god,” the steamboat was the godhead.

    Mark Twain Ron Powers 2005

  • The steamboat was the first man-made apparatus to radically interrupt the arcadian wilderness, collapse vast distance, and discharge the artifacts of distant cultures into remote places.

    Mark Twain Ron Powers 2005

  • If the river was, as T. S. Eliot later wrote, “a strong brown god,” the steamboat was the godhead.

    Mark Twain Ron Powers 2005

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