gutter

• POS: Noun, Verb (intransitive), Verb (transitive)
• HYPHEN: gut=ter

CIDE DICTIONARY

gutter, n. [OE. gotere, OF. goutiere, F. gouttière, fr. OF. gote, goute, drop, F. goutte, fr. L. gutta.].

•  A channel at the eaves of a roof for conveying away the rain; an eaves channel; an eaves trough.  [1913 Webster]
•  A small channel at the roadside or elsewhere, to lead off surface water.  [1913 Webster]

  "Gutters running with ale."  [1913 Webster]
•  Any narrow channel or groove; as, a gutter formed by erosion in the vent of a gun from repeated firing.  [1913 Webster]
•  Either of two sunken channels at either side of the bowling alley, leading directly to the sunken pit behind the pins. Balls not thrown accurately at the pins will drop into such a channel bypassing the pins, and resulting in a score of zero for that bowl.  [PJC]

Gutter member (Arch.), an architectural member made by treating the outside face of the gutter in a decorative fashion, or by crowning it with ornaments, regularly spaced, like a diminutive battlement. -- Gutter plane, a carpenter's plane with a rounded bottom for planing out gutters. -- Gutter snipe, a neglected boy running at large; a street Arab. [Slang]<-- also guttersnipe. --> -- Gutter stick (Printing), one of the pieces of furniture which separate pages in a form.

gutter, v. t. 

•  To cut or form into small longitudinal hollows; to channel.  Shak.  [1913 Webster]
•  To supply with a gutter or gutters.  Dryden.  [1913 Webster]

gutter, v. i. 

 To become channeled, as a candle when the flame flares in the wind.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

gutter, n. & v.
--n.
1 a shallow trough below the eaves of a house, or a channel at the side of a street, to carry off rainwater.
2 (prec. by the) a poor or degraded background or environment.
3 an open conduit along which liquid flows out.
4 a groove.
5 a track made by the flow of water.
--v.
1 intr. flow in streams.
2 tr. furrow, channel.

Idiom

gutter press sensational journalism concerned esp. with the private lives of public figures.

Etymology

ME f. AF gotere, OF gotiere ult. f. L gutta drop

THESAURUS

gutter

aqueduct, beat, beneath one, bicker, broad, canal, canalization, channel, cheap, chute, cloaca, cloaca maxima, coarse, crimp, cut, dance, debasing, degrading, demeaning, deplorable, dike, disgraceful, ditch, drain, earthy, eaves trough, entrenchment, flap, flick, flicker, flip, flit, flitter, flop, flutter, fosse, frank, go pitapat, goffer, gross, guide, ha-ha, headchute, humiliating, humiliative, infra dig, infra indignitatem, kennel, low, moat, opprobrious, outrageous, palpitate, penstock, pentrough, piscina, pitiful, pitter-patter, pleat, pulse, rank, raw, sad, scandalous, scupper, sewer, shameful, shocking, shoot, sink, slat, sluice, sorry, sough, splutter, sputter, sump, sunk fence, throb, too bad, trench, trough, unbecoming, uncouth, unworthy of one, vulgar, wave, waver

ROGET THESAURUS

gutter

Furrow

N furrow, groove, rut, sulcus, scratch, streak, striae, crack, score, incision, slit, chamfer, fluting, corduroy road, cradle hole, channel, gutter, trench, ditch, dike, dyke, moat, fosse, trough, kennel, ravine, tajo, thank-ye-ma'am, furrowed, ribbed, striated, sulcated, fluted, canaliculated, bisulcous, bisulcate, bisulcated, canaliferous, trisulcate, corduroy, unisulcate, costate, rimiform.

Conduit

N conduit, channel, duct, watercourse, race, head race, tail race, abito, aboideau, aboiteau, bito, acequia, acequiador, acequiamadre, arroyo, adit, aqueduct, canal, trough, gutter, pantile, flume, ingate, runner, lock-weir, tedge, vena, dike, main, gully, moat, ditch, drain, sewer, culvert, cloaca, sough, kennel, siphon, piscina, pipe, funnel, tunnel, water pipe, waste pipe, emunctory, gully hole, artery, aorta, pore, spout, scupper, adjutage, ajutage, hose, gargoyle, gurgoyle, penstock, weir, flood gate, water gate, sluice, lock, valve, rose, waterworks, pipeline, vascular.