lumber
Contents
English[edit]
Etymology[edit]
Exact origin unknown. The earliest recorded reference was to heavy, useless objects such as old, discarded furniture. Perhaps from the verb lumber in reference to meaning "awkward to move". Possibly influenced by Lumbar, an obsolete variant of Lombard, the Italian immigrant class known for being pawnbrokers and money-lenders in early England.
Pronunciation[edit]
- (UK) enPR: lŭmʹbə IPA(key): /ˈlʌm.bə/
- (US) enPR: lŭmʹbər IPA(key): /ˈlʌm.bɚ/
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Audio (US) (file) - Rhymes: -ʌmbə(r)
Noun[edit]
lumber (usually uncountable, plural lumbers)
- (Canada, US, uncountable) Wood intended as a building material.
- 1782, H. de Crèvecoeur, Letters from an American Farmer
- Here they live by fishing on the most plentiful coasts in the world; there they fell trees, by the sides of large rivers, for masts and lumber;
- 1782, H. de Crèvecoeur, Letters from an American Farmer
- (Britain) Useless things that are stored away
- 1711, Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism
- The bookful blockhead ignorantly read, / With loads of learned lumber in his head, […]
- 1711, Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism
- (obsolete) A pawnbroker's shop, or room for storing articles put in pawn; hence, a pledge, or pawn.
- Lady Murray
- They put all the little plate they had in the lumber, which is pawning it, till the ships came.
- Lady Murray
- (baseball, slang) A baseball bat
Synonyms[edit]
Translations[edit]
wood as building material
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Verb[edit]
lumber (third-person singular simple present lumbers, present participle lumbering, simple past and past participle lumbered)
- (intransitive) To move clumsily and heavily.
- 1816, Sir Walter Scott, The Antiquary
- ...he was only apprized of the arrival of the Monkbarns division by the gee-hupping of the postilion, as the post-chaise lumbered up behind him.
- 1816, Sir Walter Scott, The Antiquary
- (transitive, with with) To load down with things, to fill, to encumber, to impose an unwanted burden on
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They’ve lumbered me with all these suitcases.
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I got lumbered with that boring woman all afternoon.
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1822, [Walter Scott], chapter XI, in Peveril of the Peak. [...] In Four Volumes, volume II, Edinburgh: Printed for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co., OCLC 2392685, page 278:
- The mean utensils, pewter measures, empty cans and casks, with which this room was lumbered, proclaimed it that of the host, who slept, surrounded by his professional implements of hospitality and stock in trade.
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- To heap together in disorder.
- Rymer
- stuff lumbered together
- Rymer
- To fill or encumber with lumber.
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to lumber up a room
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Related terms[edit]
Anagrams[edit]
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