Refine this word faster
Canal
Definitions
- 1 A surname.
- 1 An artificial waterway or artificially improved river used for travel, shipping, or irrigation.
- 2 long and narrow strip of water made for boats or for irrigation wordnet
- 3 A tubular channel within the body or within a plant.
"The fossilised jaw of T. trusleri has a huge canal running through it and that’s believed to have carried all the nerve and related tissue needed for the sense of electroception."
- 4 a bodily passage or tube lined with epithelial cells and conveying a secretion or other substance wordnet
- 5 One of the faint, hazy markings resembling straight lines on early telescopic images of the surface of Mars; see Martian canals
Show 1 more definition
- 6 (astronomy) an indistinct surface feature of Mars once thought to be a system of channels; they are now believed to be an optical illusion wordnet
- 1 To dig an artificial waterway in or to (a place), especially for drainage
"In the mangrove-type salt marsh, the entire marsh must be canaled or impounded."
- 2 provide (a city) with a canal wordnet
- 3 To travel along a canal by boat
"Near Rotterdam we canalled by Delfthaven."
Etymology
Borrowed from Middle French canal, from Old French canal, from Latin canālis (“channel; canal”), from canālis (“canal”), from canna (“reed, cane”), from Ancient Greek κάννα (kánna, “reed”), from Akkadian 𒄀 (qanû, “reed”), from Sumerian 𒄀𒈾 (gi.na). Doublet of channel.
Borrowed from Middle French canal, from Old French canal, from Latin canālis (“channel; canal”), from canālis (“canal”), from canna (“reed, cane”), from Ancient Greek κάννα (kánna, “reed”), from Akkadian 𒄀 (qanû, “reed”), from Sumerian 𒄀𒈾 (gi.na). Doublet of channel.
See also for "canal"
Next best steps
Mini challenge
Unscramble this word: canal