Sluice

• POS: Noun, Verb (intransitive), Verb (transitive)

CIDE DICTIONARY

Sluice, n. [OF. escluse, F. écluse, LL. exclusa, sclusa, from L. excludere, exclusum, to shut out: cf. D. sluis sluice, from the Old French. See Exclude.].

•  An artifical 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.  [1913 Webster]
•  Hence, an opening or channel through which anything flows; a source of supply.  [1913 Webster]

  "Each sluice of affluent fortune opened soon."  [1913 Webster]

  "This home familiarity . . . opens the sluices of sensibility."  [1913 Webster]
•  The stream flowing through a flood gate.  [1913 Webster]
•  A long box or trough through which water flows, -- used for washing auriferous earth.  [1913 Webster]

Sluice gate, the sliding gate of a sluice.

Sluice, v. t. 

•  To emit by, or as by, flood gates.  Milton.  [1913 Webster]
•  To wet copiously, as by opening a sluice; as, to sluice meadows.  Howitt.  [1913 Webster]

  "He dried his neck and face, which he had been sluicing with cold water."  [1913 Webster]
•  To wash with, or in, a stream of water running through a sluice; as, to sluice eart or gold dust in mining.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

Sluice, n. & v.
--n.
1 (also sluice-gate, sluice-valve) a sliding gate or other contrivance for controlling the volume or flow of water.
2 (also sluice-way) an artificial water-channel esp. for washing ore.
3 a place for rinsing.
4 the act or an instance of rinsing.
5 the water above or below or issuing through a floodgate.
--v.
1 tr. provide or wash with a sluice or sluices.
2 tr. rinse, pour or throw water freely upon.
3 tr. (foll. by out, away) wash out or away with a flow of water.
4 tr. flood with water from a sluice.
5 intr. (of water) rush out from a sluice, or as if from a sluice.

Etymology

ME f. OF escluse ult. f. L excludere EXCLUDE

THESAURUS

Sluice

aboideau, air lock, aqueduct, arroyo, avenue, baptize, bath, bathe, bed, blow out, blowhole, canal, channel, chute, cloaca, cloaca maxima, creek bed, culvert, debouch, deluge, dip, dock gate, donga, door, douche, douse, drain, drain out, drench, drown, dry bed, duck, dunk, egress, empty, emunctory, escape, estuary, exhaust, exit, find vent, float, flood, flood-hatch, floodgate, flow, flow on, flow out, flume, flush, flush out, gargle, gate, gulch, gully, gullyhole, gush, gush out, gutter, head gate, headchute, headrace, holystone, inundate, irrigate, irrigation ditch, jet, kennel, lather, launder, lave, lock, lock gate, loophole, mop, mop up, nullah, opening, out, outcome, outfall, outflow, outgate, outgo, outlet, outpour, penstock, piscina, pore, port, pour, pour on, pour out, race, rain, rinse, rinse out, ritually immerse, river bed, riverway, roll, run out, runnel, sally port, scour, scrub, scrub up, scupper, sewer, shampoo, shower, sink, sluice gate, sluice out, soak, soap, sough, spew out, spillbox, spillway, spiracle, sponge, spout, spout out, spurt, stream, stream bed, streamway, submerge, sump, surge, swab, swamp, swash, swash channel, syringe, tailrace, tap, tide gate, toivel, tub, vent, ventage, venthole, vomit forth, vomitory, wadi, wash, wash out, wash up, water carrier, water channel, water furrow, water gap, water gate, watercourse, waterway, waterworks, way out, weir, well, well out, whelm

ROGET THESAURUS

Sluice

Limit

N limit, boundary, bounds, confine, enclave, term, bourn, verge, curbstone, but, pale, reservation, termination, terminus, stint, frontier, precinct, marches, backwoods, boundary line, landmark, line of demarcation, line of circumvallation, pillars of Hercules, Rubicon, turning point, ne plus ultra, sluice, floodgate, definite, conterminate, conterminable, terminal, frontier, bordering, thus far, thus far and no further, stick to the reservation, go beyond the pale, Special.

Egress

N egress, exit, issue, emersion, emergence, outbreak, outburst, eruption, proruption, emanation, egression, evacuation, exudation, transudation, extravasation, perspiration, sweating, leakage, percolation, distillation, oozing, gush, outpour, outpouring, effluence, effusion, effluxion, drain, dribbling, defluxion, drainage, outcome, output, discharge, export, expatriation, emigration, remigration, debouch, debouche, emunctory, exodus, emigrant, outlet, vent, spout, tap, sluice, floodgate, pore, vomitory, outgate, sally port, way out, mouth, door, path, conduit, airpipe, effused, outgoing.

River

N river, running water, jet, spirt, spurt, squirt, spout, spray, splash, rush, gush, jet d'eau, sluice, water spout, water fall, cascade, force, foss, lin, linn, ghyll, Niagara, cataract, rapids, white water, catadupe, cataclysm, debacle, inundation, deluge, chute, washout, rain, rainfall, serein, shower, scud, downpour, driving rain, drenching rain, cloudburst, hyetology, hyetography, predominance of Aquarius, reign of St. Swithin, mizzle, drizzle, stillicidum, plash, dropping, falling weather, northeaster, hurricane, typhoon, stream, course, flux, flow, profluence, effluence, defluxion, flowing, current, tide, race, coulee, spring, artesian well, fount, fountain, rill, rivulet, gill, gullet, rillet, streamlet, brooklet, branch, runnel, sike, burn, beck, creek, brook, bayou, stream, river, reach, tributary, geyser, spout, waterspout, body of water, torrent, rapids, flush, flood, swash, spring tide, high tide, full tide, bore, tidal bore, eagre, hygre, fresh, freshet, indraught, reflux, undercurrent, eddy, vortex, gurge, whirlpool, Maelstrom, regurgitation, overflow, confluence, corrivation, wave, billow, surge, swell, ripple, anerythmon gelasma, beach comber, riffle, rollers, ground swell, surf, breakers, white horses, whitecaps, rough sea, heavy sea, high seas, cross sea, long sea, short sea, chopping sea, hydrodynamics, hydraulics, hydraulicostatics, rain gauge, flowmeter, pegology, irrigation, pump, watering pot, watering cart, hydrant, syringe, garden hose, lawn spray, bhisti, mussuk, fluent, diffluent, profluent, affluent, tidal, flowing, meandering, meandry, meandrous, fluvial, fluviatile, streamy, showery, rainy, pluvial, stillicidous, stillatitious, for men may come and men may go but I go on foreve, that old man river, he just keeps rolling along.

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.