Sluice

Pronunciation

• IPA: /sluːs/
• Rhymes: -uːs

Origin

Old French escluse (French écluse), from Late Latin exclusa, sclusa, from Latin

exclūsus, form of exclūdō ("I shut out, I exclude") (English exclude).

Cognate to Dutch sluis, from Old French.

Full definition of sluice

Noun

1. 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.
2. Hence, an opening or channel through which anything flows; a source of supply.
• HarteEach sluice of affluent fortune opened soon.
• I. TaylorThis home familiarity ... opens the sluices of sensibility.
3. The stream flowing through a flood gate.
4. (mining) A long box or trough through which water flows, used for washing auriferous earth.
5. (linguistics) An instance of wh-stranding ellipsis, or sluicing.

Derived terms

• sluiceway
• sluice gate

Coordinate terms

• dam
• lock
• weir

Verb

1. (rare) To emit by, or as by, flood gates. -Milton.
2. To wet copiously, as by opening a sluice; as, to sluice meadows. Howitt.He dried his neck and face, which he had been sluicing with cold water. -De Quincey.
3. 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.
4. To elide the C` in a coordinated wh-question

Coordinate terms

• (washing in mining) pan

Anagrams

• lucies