Dam
[dæm]
Definition
(noun.) female parent of an animal especially domestic livestock.
(noun.) a barrier constructed to contain the flow of water or to keep out the sea.
(verb.) obstruct with, or as if with, a dam; 'dam the gorges of the Yangtse River'.
Typist: Ludwig--From WordNet
Definition
(n.) A female parent; -- used of beasts, especially of quadrupeds; sometimes applied in contempt to a human mother.
(n.) A kind or crowned piece in the game of draughts.
(n.) A barrier to prevent the flow of a liquid; esp., a bank of earth, or wall of any kind, as of masonry or wood, built across a water course, to confine and keep back flowing water.
(n.) A firebrick wall, or a stone, which forms the front of the hearth of a blast furnace.
(v. t.) To obstruct or restrain the flow of, by a dam; to confine by constructing a dam, as a stream of water; -- generally used with in or up.
(v. t.) To shut up; to stop up; to close; to restrain.
Editor: Will
Synonyms and Synonymous
n. Mother (of a beast), female parent.
Typed by Humphrey
Definition
n. a mother applied to quadrupeds.
n. an embankment to restrain water: the water thus confined.—v.t. to keep back water by a bank:—pr.p. dam′ming; pa.p. dammed.
Checker: Percy
Examples
- I ain't going to have any of this dam sentimental nonsense and humbug here, sir, the father cried out. William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- When you dam up a stream of water, as soon as the dam is full, as much water must run over the dam-head as if there was no dam at all. Adam Smith. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.
- How he DU dam and swear, the servants would cry, delighted at his precocity. William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- When they have got this quantity, the dam is full, and the whole stream which flows in afterwards must run over. Adam Smith. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.
- Usually a leak in a dam or reservoir occurs near the bottom. Bertha M. Clark. General Science.
- The higher and stronger the dam-head, the greater must be the difference in the depth of water behind and before it. Adam Smith. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.
- The stream showed clear and smooth-looking in the glasses and, below the curl of the falling water, the spray from the dam was blowing in the wind. Hemingway, Ernest. For Whom The Bell Tolls.
- The Bursting of Dams and Reservoirs. Bertha M. Clark. General Science.
- Besides, the stream had been dammed so that the valley was a lake. Ulysses S. Grant. Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant.
- He ought to be dammed--or leveed, I should more properly say. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- Such feeling as Eustacia had idly given to Wildeve was dammed into a flood by Thomasin. Thomas Hardy. The Return of the Native.
- In the second case the blood returning by the superficial veins is dammed back. Walter Libby. An Introduction to the History of Science.
- The task is turned from the damming and restricting of wants to the creation of fine environments for them. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
Edited by Georgina