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sewer
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
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English
Etymology 1
From Middle English sewer, seuer, from Anglo-Norman sewere (“water-course”), from Old French sewiere (“overflow channel for a fishpond”), from Vulgar Latin *exaquāria (“drain for carrying water off”), from Latin ex (“out of, from”) + aquāria (“of or pertaining to waters”) or from a root *exaquāre.
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) enPR: so͞o'ə, IPA(key): /ˈs(j)uːə/
- (General American) enPR: so͞oər, IPA(key): /ˈsuɚ/
Audio (US): (file) Audio (UK): (file) Note: this pronunciation may be nonstandard or incorrect: split into two files Audio (General Australian): (file) - Homophone: suer
- Rhymes: -uːə(ɹ)
- Hyphenation: sew‧er
Noun
sewer (plural sewers)
- A pipe or channel, or system of pipes or channels, used to remove human waste and to provide drainage.
- open sewers
- 2014 June 14, “It’s a gas”, in The Economist, volume 411, number 8891, London: The Economist Group, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 12 June 2014:
- One of the hidden glories of Victorian engineering is proper drains. Isolating a city’s effluent and shipping it away in underground sewers has probably saved more lives than any medical procedure except vaccination.
Derived terms
Translations
pipes used to remove human waste and to provide drainage
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Verb
sewer (third-person singular simple present sewers, present participle sewering, simple past and past participle sewered)
- (transitive) To provide (a place) with a system of sewers.
Etymology 2
From Middle English seware, seuere, from Anglo-Norman asseour, from Old French asseoir (“find a seat for”), from Latin assidēre, present active participle of assideō (“attend to”), from ad (“to, towards, at”) + sedeō (“sit”).
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) enPR: so͞o'ə, IPA(key): /ˈs(j)uːə/
- (General American) enPR: so͞oər, IPA(key): /ˈsuɚ/
Audio (Southern England): (file)
- Hyphenation: sew‧er
Noun
sewer (plural sewers)
- (historical) An official in charge of a princely household, also responsible for the ceremonial task of attending at dinners, seating the guests and serving dishes.
- 1819 December 20 (indicated as 1820), Walter Scott, chapter VII, in Ivanhoe; a Romance. […], volume II, Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co. […], →OCLC, pages 116–117:
- While the Saxon was plunged in these painful reflections, the door of their prison opened, and gave entrance to a sewer, holding his white rod of office.
- 2011, Thomas Penn, Winter King, Penguin, published 2012, page 287:
- His nephew Charles, meanwhile, had grown up in the royal household, working as a sewer, or waiter.
Etymology 3
Pronunciation
Noun
sewer (plural sewers)
- One who sews.
- 1890, Jacob A[ugust] Riis, “The Sweaters of Jewtown”, in How the Other Half Lives: Studies among the Tenements of New York, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons, →OCLC, pages 131–132:
- Up under the roof three men are making boys’ jackets at twenty cents a piece, of which the sewer takes eight, the ironer three, the finisher five cents, and the buttonhole-maker two and a quarter, leaving a cent and three-quarters to pay for the drumming up, the fetching and bringing back of the goods.
- A small tortricid moth, the larva of which sews together the edges of a leaf using silk.
- the apple-leaf sewer, Ancylis nubeculana
Synonyms
- (one who sews): sempster/sempstress (man/woman), seamster/seamstress (man/woman), tailor, sewist
Translations
person who sews clothing
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Anagrams
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Javanese
Romanization
sewer
Middle English
Verb
sewer
- alternative form of suren
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