lake

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English[edit]

A mountain lake

Pronunciation[edit]

Etymology 1[edit]

From Middle English lake (“lake, watercourse, body of water”), from Old English lacu (“lake, pond, pool, stream, watercourse”), from Proto-Germanic *lakō, *lōkiz (“stream, pool, water aggregation", originally "ditch, drainage, seep”), from Proto-Germanic *lekaną (“to leak, drain”), from Proto-Indo-European *leg-, *leǵ- (“to leak”). Cognate with Scots lake (“pond, pool, flowing water of a stream”), Dutch laak (“lake, pond, stream”), Middle Low German lāke (“standing water, water pooled in a riverbed”), German Lache (“pool, puddle”), Icelandic lækur (“stream, brook, flow”). See also leak, leach.

Despite their similarity in form and meaning, English lake is not related to Latin lacus (“hollow, lake, pond”), Scottish Gaelic loch (“lake”), Ancient Greek λάκκος (lákkos, “waterhole, tank, pond, pit”), all from Proto-Indo-European *lakʷ- (“lake, pool”). Instead, this root is represented by Old English lagu (“sea, flood, water, ocean”), through Proto-Germanic *laguz, *lahō (“sea, water”), perhaps related to Albanian lag (“to water, make wet, moisturize”). See lay.

Noun[edit]

lake (plural lakes)

  1. (now chiefly dialectal) A small stream of running water; a channel for water; a drain.
  2. A large, landlocked, naturally-occurring stretch of water.
    • 1898, Winston Churchill, chapter 4, The Celebrity:
      Judge Short had gone to town, and Farrar was off for a three days' cruise up the lake. I was bitterly regretting I had not gone with him when the distant notes of a coach horn reached my ear, and I descried a four-in-hand winding its way up the inn road from the direction of Mohair.
  3. A large amount of liquid; as, a wine lake.
    • 1991, Robert DeNiro (actor), Backdraft:
      So you punched out a window for ventilation. Was that before or after you noticed you were standing in a lake of gasoline?
Synonyms[edit]
Derived terms[edit]
Derived terms
Translations[edit]
body of water
See also[edit]
References[edit]
  • [2009], Sisam Kenneth, Fourteenth Century Verse and Prose, BiblioBazaar, ISBN 1110730802, 9781110730803:
  • [1999], Ann W. Astell, Political allegory in late medieval England, Cornell University Press, ISBN 0801435609, 9780801435607, page 192:
  • [1961], Kenneth Cameron, English Place Names, B. T. Batsford Limited, SBN 416 27990 2, page 164:
  • [2009], Eduard Adolf Ferdinand Maetzner, An English Grammar; Methodical, Analytical, and Historical, BiblioBazaar, LLC, ISBN 1113149965, 9781113149961, page 200:
  • [1992], Matti Rissanen, History of Englishes: new methods and interpretations in historical linguistics, Walter de Gruyter, ISBN 3110132168, 9783110132168, page 513-514:
  • [1858], Robert Ferguson, English surnames: and their place in the Teutonic family, G. Routledge & co., page 368:

Etymology 2[edit]

From Middle English lake, lak, lac (also loke, laik, layke), from Old English lāc (“play, sport, strife, battle, sacrifice, offering, gift, present, booty, message”), from Proto-Germanic *laiką (“play, fight”), *laikaz (“game, dance, hymn, sport”), from Proto-Indo-European *loig-, *leig- (“to bounce, shake, tremble”). Cognate with Old High German leih (“song, melody, music”) and Albanian luaj (“I move, play”). More at lay.

Noun[edit]

Wikipedia has an article on:

Wikipedia

lake (plural lakes)

  1. (obsolete) An offering, sacrifice, gift.
  2. (dialectal) Play; sport; game; fun; glee.
Derived terms[edit]

Verb[edit]

lake (third-person singular simple present lakes, present participle laking, simple past and past participle laked)

  1. (obsolete) To present an offering.
  2. (chiefly dialectal) To leap, jump, exert oneself, play.

Etymology 3[edit]

From Old English lachen

Noun[edit]

lake (plural lakes)

  1. (obsolete) Fine linen.

Etymology 4[edit]

From French laque (“lacquer”), from Persian لاک (lāk), from Hindi lakh, from Sanskrit laksha (“one hundred thousand”), referring to the number of insects that gather on the trees and make the resin seep out.

Noun[edit]

lake (plural lakes)

  1. In dyeing and painting, an often fugitive crimson or vermillion pigment derived from an organic colorant (cochineal or madder, for example) and an inorganic, generally metallic mordant.
Derived terms[edit]
Translations[edit]

Verb[edit]

lake (third-person singular simple present lakes, present participle laking, simple past and past participle laked)

  1. To make lake-red.

Etymology 5[edit]

Compare lek.

Verb[edit]

lake (third-person singular simple present lakes, present participle laking, simple past and past participle laked)

  1. (obsolete) To play; to sport.

Anagrams[edit]

Dutch[edit]

Pronunciation[edit]

Verb[edit]

lake

  1. singular present subjunctive of laken

Anagrams[edit]

Norwegian[edit]

Noun[edit]

lake m

  1. pickle, brine
  2. burbot, eelpout

Verb[edit]

lake

  1. To pickle

Swedish[edit]

Swedish Wikipedia has an article on:

Wikipedia sv

Noun[edit]

lake c

  1. burbot (a freshwater fish: Lota lota)

Declension[edit]

Declension of lake
singular plural
Common indefinite definite indefinite definite
nominative lake laken lakar lakarna
genitive lakes lakens lakars lakarnas
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