sluice
/ˈslʉs/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.63 in modern English
8
Scrabble Score
6
Letters
1
Syllables
6
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
An artificial passage for water, fitted with a valve or gate, for example in a canal lock or a mill stream, for stopping or regulating the flow.
noun
A water gate or floodgate.
noun
A long box or trough through which water flows, used for washing auriferous earth.
Example Sentences
- "At leaſt, I'm ſure I can fiſh it out of her. She's the very Sluce to her Lady's Secrets;—'Tis but ſetting her Mill agoing, and I can drein her of 'em all."
- "Each sluice of affluent fortune open'd soon."
- "This home familiarity […] opens the sluices of sensibility."
- "Another powerful argument that sluices are CPs comes from the positional distribution of sluiced wh-phrases in a variety of languages."
- "Nigh on the plain, in many cells prepared, / That underneath had veins of liquid fire / Sluiced from the lake, a second multitude / With wondrous art founded the massy ore, / Severing each kind, and scummed the bullion-dross."
- "Nine - mile Creek has been dug out again and again , and has been sluiced three times"
Etymology
From Middle English sluse, alteration of scluse, from Anglo-Norman escluse (“sluice, floodgate”), from Late Latin exclusa (“extrusion, gate”), from Latin exclūsus, form of exclūdō (“to shut out, to exclude”) (English exclude). Cognate to Dutch sluis.
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: sluse, escluse, exclusa, exclūsus