Adjacent Words

Estuary definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

ES'TUARY, n. [L. oestuarium, from oestuo, to boil or foam, oestus, heat, fury, storm.]
1. An arm of the sea; a frith; a narrow passage, or the mouth of a river or lake, where the tide meets the current, or flows and ebbs.
2. A vapor-bath.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

n
1: the wide part of a river where it nears the sea; fresh and salt water mix

Merriam Webster's

noun (plural -aries) Etymology: Latin aestuarium, from aestus boiling, tide; akin to Latin aestas summer — more at edify Date: 1538 a water passage where the tide meets a river current; especially an arm of the sea at the lower end of a river

Oxford Reference Dictionary

n. (pl. -ies) a wide tidal mouth of a river. Derivatives: estuarine adj. Etymology: L aestuarium tidal channel f. aestus tide

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Estuary Es"tu*a*ry, a. Belonging to, or formed in, an estuary; as, estuary strata. --Lyell.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Estuary Es"tu*a*ry, n.; pl. Estuaries. [L. aestuarium, from aestuare to surge. See Estuate.] [Written also [ae]stuary.] 1. A place where water boils up; a spring that wells forth. [Obs.] --Boyle. 2. A passage, as the mouth of a river or lake, where the tide meets the current; an arm of the sea; a frith. it to the sea was often by long and wide estuaries. --Dana.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(estuaries) An estuary is the wide part of a river where it joins the sea. ...naval manoeuvres in the Clyde estuary. N-COUNT; N-IN-NAMES

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

n. Frith, firth, fiord, inlet, creek, arm of the sea.

Moby Thesaurus

arm, armlet, avenue, bay, bayou, belt, bight, blowhole, boca, channel, chute, cove, creek, debouch, door, egress, emunctory, escape, euripus, exhaust, exit, fjord, floodgate, flume, frith, gulf, gut, harbor, inlet, kyle, loch, loophole, mouth, narrow, narrow seas, narrows, natural harbor, opening, out, outcome, outfall, outgate, outgo, outlet, pore, port, reach, road, roads, roadstead, sally port, sluice, sound, spiracle, spout, strait, straits, tap, vent, ventage, venthole, vomitory, way out, weir