Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A relatively small, usually open craft of a size that might be carried aboard a ship.
  • noun An inland vessel of any size.
  • noun A ship or submarine.
  • noun A dish shaped like a boat.
  • intransitive verb To travel by boat.
  • intransitive verb To ride a boat for pleasure.
  • intransitive verb To transport by boat.
  • intransitive verb To place in a boat.
  • idiom (in the same boat) In the same situation as another or others.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A small vessel or water-craft; especially, a small open vessel moved by oars.
  • noun Any vessel for navigation: usually described by another word or by a prefix denoting its use or mode of propulsion: as, a packet-boat, passage-boat, steamboat, etc. The term is frequently applied colloquially to vessels even of the largest size.
  • noun Any open dish or vessel resembling a boat: as, a gravy-boat; a butter-boat.
  • noun In the Roman Catholic Church, the vessel containing the incense to be placed in the thurible when needed.
  • noun A narrow, shallow vessel of platinum or porcelain which serves to hold a substance that is to be subjected to ultimate analysis, or to the action of gases, and which for that purpose is placed in a glass or porcelain tube.
  • noun A small device attached to each side of a loom for weaving a plain selvage in a fabric having a twill or figured weave.
  • To transport in a boat: as, to boat goods across a lake.
  • To provide with boats.
  • To go in a boat; row.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To transport in a boat.
  • transitive verb To place in a boat.
  • transitive verb See under Oar.
  • noun A small open vessel, or water craft, usually moved by cars or paddles, but often by a sail.
  • noun Hence, any vessel; usually with some epithet descriptive of its use or mode of propulsion; The term is sometimes applied to steam vessels, even of the largest class.
  • noun A vehicle, utensil, or dish, somewhat resembling a boat in shape.
  • noun See under Advice.
  • noun (Naut.) an iron hook with a point on the back, fixed to a long pole, to pull or push a boat, raft, log, etc.
  • noun a rope for fastening a boat; -- usually called a painter.
  • noun [Colloq.] in the same situation or predicament.
  • intransitive verb To go or row in a boat.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A craft used for transportation of goods, fishing, racing, recreational cruising, or military use on or in the water, propelled by oars or outboard motor or inboard motor or by wind.
  • noun poker slang A full house.
  • noun chemistry One of two possible conformations of cyclohexane rings (the other being chair), shaped roughly like a boat.
  • verb To travel by boat.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a dish (often boat-shaped) for serving gravy or sauce
  • noun a small vessel for travel on water
  • verb ride in a boat on water

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English bot, from Old English bāt; see bheid- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English boot, bot, boet, boyt ("boat"), from Old English bāt ("boat"), from Proto-Germanic *baitaz, *baitan (“boat, small ship”), from Proto-Indo-European *bheid- (“to break, split”). Cognate with Old Norse beit ("boat").

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