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Sluice

//sluːs// noun, verb

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    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.
  2. 2
    conduit that carries a rapid flow of water controlled by a sluicegate wordnet
  3. 3
    A water gate or floodgate.
  4. 4
    Hence, an opening or channel through which anything flows; a source of supply.

    "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."

  5. 5
    The stream flowing through a floodgate.
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  1. 6
    A long box or trough through which water flows, used for washing auriferous earth.
  2. 7
    An instance of wh-stranding ellipsis, or sluicing.
Verb
  1. 1
    To emit by, or as by, flood gates. rare, transitive

    "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."

  2. 2
    irrigate with water from a sluice wordnet
  3. 3
    To wet copiously, as by opening a sluice transitive

    "Nine - mile Creek has been dug out again and again , and has been sluiced three times"

  4. 4
    draw through a sluice wordnet
  5. 5
    To wash with, or in, a stream of water running through a sluice. transitive

    "to sluice earth or gold dust in a sluice box in placer mining"

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  1. 6
    transport in or send down a sluice wordnet
  2. 7
    To wash (down or out). broadly, transitive

    "[…] he did plot the Duke of Gloucester's death, / Suggest his soon-believing adversaries, / And consequently, like a traitor coward, / Sluiced out his innocent soul through streams of blood"

  3. 8
    pour as if from a sluice wordnet
  4. 9
    To flow, pour. intransitive

    "In the trough behind the white wave / Helen shook her dark head, the water sluiced from her shoulders / And rose-tipped breasts."

  5. 10
    To elide the complement in a coordinated wh-question. See sluicing.

Etymology

Etymology 1

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 (“I shut out, I exclude”) (English exclude). Cognate to Dutch sluis.

Etymology 2

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 (“I shut out, I exclude”) (English exclude). Cognate to Dutch sluis.

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