sail
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /seɪl/
ipa: [seɪɫ]
rhymes: -eɪl
homophone: sale
Forms: form: sails
Etymology: From Middle English saile, sayle, seil, seyl, from Old English seġl, from Proto-West Germanic *segl, from Proto-Germanic *seglą. Cognate with West Frisian seil, Low German Segel, Dutch zeil, German Segel, Danish sejl, Swedish segel.
Senses: examples: text: When we haue laught to ſee the ſailes conceiue / And grow big bellied with the wanton winde; […]
ref: c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “A Midsommer Nights Dreame”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene i]:
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: A piece of fabric attached to a boat and arranged such that it causes the wind to drive the boat along. The sail may be attached to the boat via a combination of mast, spars and ropes.
examples: text: Take in sail: a storm is coming.
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: The concept of a sail or sails, as if a substance.
glosses: The power harnessed by a sail or sails, or the use of this power for travel or transport.
examples: text: Let's go for a sail.
glosses: A trip in a boat, especially a sailboat.
examples: text: Twenty sail were in sight.
text: "[…] The quay is upwards of 1,000 feet in length, and capable of accommodating more than 100 sail of traders; and there are generally a considerable number of vessels of from 40 to 300 tons burden, from various parts of the world, waiting to receive their cargoes."
ref: 1945 May and June, Charles E. Lee, “The Penrhyn Railway and its Locomotives—1”, in Railway Magazine, page 142, text published 1848:
qualifier: plural "sail"
glosses: A sailing vessel; a vessel of any kind; a craft.
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: The conning tower of a submarine.
examples: text: So furious had been the gusts, that high buildings in town had had the lead stripped off their roofs; and in the country, trees had been torn up, and sails of windmills carried away; and gloomy accounts had come in from the coast, of shipwreck and death.
ref: 1860 December – 1861 August, Charles Dickens, chapter XX, in Great Expectations […], volume II, London: Chapman and Hall, […], published October 1861, →OCLC, page 327:
glosses: The blade of a windmill.
glosses: A tower-like structure found on the dorsal (topside) surface of submarines.
glosses: The floating organ of siphonophores, such as the Portuguese man-of-war.
examples: text: We caught three sails today.
topics: fishing
hobbies
lifestyle
glosses: A sailfish.
topics: biology
history
human-sciences
natural-sciences
paleontology
sciences
glosses: an outward projection of the spine, occurring in certain dinosaurs and synapsids
examples: text: Like an eagle […]soaring / / To weather his broad sails.
ref: 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book V, Canto IV”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 42:
glosses: Anything resembling a sail, such as a wing.
Synonyms: word: sail
Hyponyms: word: course
word: crab claw
word: driver
word: extra
word: fisherman
word: genoa
word: gennaker
word: headsail
word: jib
word: lateen
word: mainsail
word: mizzen
word: moonsail
word: royal
word: skysail
word: spanker
word: spinnaker
word: spritsail
word: staysail
word: studding
word: topgallant
word: topsail
word: trysail
Meronyms: word: batten
word: bunt
word: clew
word: leech
word: luff
word: roach
word: tack
Derived terms: after-sail
balloon sail
by sail
crowd sail
drag sail
drift sail
electric sail
full sail
gaff sail
knock the wind out of someone's sails
light sail
mackerel sky and mare's-tails make lofty ships carry low sails
mackerel sky and mare's-tails make tall ships carry low sails
mainsail
make sail
photon sail
point of sail
riding sail
sailback
sailboard
sailboat
sail-by
sail-by salute
sailcloth
sail coat
sail curve
sailduck
sailer
sail fine
sailfish
sail-fluke
sail foam
sailing
sail-like
saillike
sail loft
sail-plan
sail-road
sail sign
sail vault
sail wagon
sail-yard
sailyard
sailyarn
scudding sail
set sail
set sails
shoulder-of-mutton sail
smoke sail
solar sail
spritsail
square sail
storm sail
strike sail
studding sail
take the wind out of someone's sails
topgallant sail
topsail
trim one's sails
under sail
working sail
Related terms: word: W:Template:Sail Types
word: W:Parts of a sail