fleet
Definition from Wiktionary, a free dictionary
Contents |
[edit] English
[edit] Pronunciation
[edit] Etymology 1
From Middle English flet, flete, from Old English flēot (“‘ship’”)
[edit] Noun
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Singular |
Plural |
fleet (plural fleets)
- A group of vessels or vehicles.
- (nautical) A number of vessels in company, especially war vessels; also, the collective naval force of a country, etc.
- (nautical, British Royal Navy) Any command of vessels exceeding a squadron in size, or a rear-admiral's command, composed of five sail-of-the-line, with any number of smaller vessels.
[edit] Translations
a group of vessels
[edit] Etymology 2
From Middle English flet, flete, from Old English flēot (“‘river, estuary’”)
[edit] Noun
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Singular |
Plural |
fleet (plural fleets)
- (nautical, obsolete) A flood; a creek or inlet, a bay or estuary, a river subject to the tide.
- (nautical) A location, as on a navigable river, where barges are secured.
[edit] Derived terms
[edit] Etymology 3
From Middle English fleten (“‘float’”), from Old English flēotan (“‘float’”)
[edit] Verb
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Infinitive |
Third person singular |
Simple past |
Past participle |
Present participle |
to fleet (third-person singular simple present fleets, present participle fleeting, simple past and past participle fleeted)
- (obsolete) To float.
- [Antony] "Our sever'd navy too,
Have knit again, and fleet, threat'ning most sea-like." -- Shakespeare, Antony and Cleopatra
- [Antony] "Our sever'd navy too,
- To pass over rapidly; to skim the surface of
- a ship that fleets the gulf
- To hasten over; to cause to pass away lightly, or in mirth and joy
- And so through this dark world they fleet / Divided, till in death they meet; -- Percy Shelley, Rosalind and Helen.
- (nautical) To move up a rope, so as to haul to more advante; esp. to draw apart the blocks of a tackle.
- (nautical, obsolete) To shift the position of dead-eyes when the shrouds are become too long.
- To cause to slip down the barrel of a capstan or windlass, as a rope or chain.
- To take the cream from; to skim.
[edit] Adjective
fleet (comparative fleeter or more fleet, superlative fleetest or most fleet)
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Positive |
Comparative |
Superlative |
- Swift in motion; moving with velocity; light and quick in going from place to place; nimble; fast.
- 1908: Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows
- ...it was not till the afternoon that they came out on the high-road, their first high-road; and there disaster, fleet and unforeseen, sprang out on them--disaster momentous indeed to their expedition...
- 1908: Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows
- Light; superficially thin; not penetrating deep, as soil.

