spate
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /speɪt/
rhymes: -eɪt
homophone: speight
Forms: form: spates
form: spating
form: spated
form: spated
Etymology: The noun is derived from Middle English spate, spait (“a flood”), influenced by Scots spate (“torrent of water, flood; heavy downpour of rain; (figurative) bout of drinking; large crowd of people; flood of events, words, etc.”). The further etymology of the Middle English and Scots words is uncertain; they are possibly related to English spatter and Dutch spatten (“to spatter, splash”), possibly ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *sp(y)ēw-, *spyū- (whence English spit (“to evacuate (saliva or another substance) from the mouth, etc.”)), which is imitative of spitting.
The verb is derived from the noun, probably influenced by Scots spate (“to flood, swell; to rain heavily; (figurative) to scold fiercely”).
Senses: examples: text: [H]e paused in a reverie of wilderment and wonder when he could not discern the old fishing-places—they were deeply and darkly flooded for many yards on every side of the spated stream.
ref: 1844 October, J. Nevay, “Mary Hepburn; or, The Victim of Slander. Chapter X.”, in The Ladies’ Cabinet of Fashion, Music, and Romance, volume II (New Series), London: G. Henderson, →OCLC, page 255:
text: A few of the very best angling streams in the Highlands are almost perennial in their flow; the Halladale, on the contrary, is subject to spating.
ref: 1886 February 20, W. Murdoch, “Salmon and Trout-fishing in the Highlands of Scotland.—VII. The Halladale (Sutherlandshire).”, in R. B. Marston, editor, The Fishing Gazette; Devoted to Angling, River, Lake, and Sea Fishing and Fish Culture, volume XII, London: Charles William Bradley & Co. […], →OCLC, page 97, column 1:
text: The gates of Anger open, and the flood, / Spated with hate, unstemmed of men, pours out, / Drenching the trench with hot and beaded blood, / Choking each challenging or anguish'd shout.
ref: 1918, Robert B. Ross, “The Silent Guns”, in The Fifty-first in France, London; New York, N.Y.: Hodder and Stoughton, →OCLC, part I (From May to December 1915), page 84:
text: The day was lovely and clear after the rain. The river had not spated as much as I had expected, and there was only one place in my sector where lorries might have found difficulty in crossing the nala.
ref: [1938], Rajput [pseudonym; Arthur John Eardley Dawson], chapter 12, in Khyber Calling!, London: Hurst & Blackett, →OCLC, section 3, page 181:
text: river strontian, argyll […] This is a good example of a short, west-coast spating oligotrophic river. […] The river is subject to a rise in water level of up to 1 m following heavy rain and the water is clear and fairly low in dissolved nutrients.
ref: 1977, “Open Waters”, in A Nature Conservation Review, volume 2 (Site Accounts), Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press for the Nature Conservancy Council and Natural Environment Research Council, published 2011, →ISBN, page 202, column 1:
text: On one occasion the Segre was spating after heavy rain and threatening to overflow, whereupon [Saint] Ermengol fell down on his knees "begging Christ that the force of the river might turn away from the Virgin Mother" and crying out, "O water, do you dare to perform this sacrilege so that you might break up the estate of the church because you are bored with your usual path? Desist from this crime, violator, I challenge you in the divine name to hear my prayer." The next day the waters subsided, and Ermengol was able to continue the construction of a bridge across the Segre.
ref: 2018, Matthew Carr, “Scholars, Pilgrims, and Troubadours”, in The Savage Frontier: The Pyrenees in History and the Imagination, New York, N.Y.: The New Press, →ISBN, part II (Pyrenean Crossings):
text: He [Charles VI of France] therefore bids them 'Rush on his [Henry [V]'s] host' with the force of an Alpine river spated with snow melt.
ref: 2023, Nicholas Dobson, “The French Talk Themselves Up”, in The Regal Throne: Power, Politics and Ribaldry: A Guide to Shakespeare’s Richard II, Henry IV Parts 1 and 2, and Henry V, Eastbourne, East Sussex: Sussex Academic Press, →ISBN, book 4 (Reputation Redeemed! Henry V – Model Warrior King), page 422:
glosses: To (suddenly) flood or inundate (a river or other watercourse) with water.
glosses: To (suddenly) rain heavily; to pour.