pond
UK /pɒnd/ · US /pɑnd/ noun, proper noun, verb
Forms ponds the pond ponding ponded
- noun An inland body of standing water, either natural or man-made, that is smaller than a lake.
- noun An inland body of standing water of any size that is fed by springs rather than by a river.
- proper noun (informal) Chiefly in across the pond: the Atlantic Ocean. “I wonder how they do this on the other side of the pond.”
- verb (transitive) To block the flow of water so that it can escape only through evaporation or seepage; to dam.
- verb (transitive) To make into a pond; to collect, as water, in a pond by damming.
- verb (intransitive) To form a pond; to pool.
- verb (transitive, obsolete) To ponder.
- proper noun A surname.
Synonyms
Etymology
From Middle English pond, ponde (“pond, pool”), probably from Old English *pond, *pand (attested in placenames), a variant of *pund (“enclosure”). Doublet of pound.
Clipping of ponder.
* As an English surname, from both senses of the noun pound.
* As a German and north/Low German surname, Americanized from Pfund and Pund respectively, both related to the above.
Webster’s 1913
- noun A body of water, naturally or artificially confined, and usually of less extent than a lake. "Through pond or pool." Milton.
- verb To make into a pond; to collect, as water, in a pond by damming.
- verb To ponder. [Obs.]
Etymology [Probably originally, an inclosed body of water, and the same word as pound. See Pound an inclosure.]
Etymology [See Ponder.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “pond”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details