Library / English Dictionary

SPOUT

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

An opening that allows the passage of liquids or grain

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Hypernyms ("spout" is a kind of...):

opening (a vacant or unobstructed space that is man-made)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "spout"):

gargoyle (a spout that terminates in a grotesquely carved figure of a person or animal)

nose; nozzle (a projecting spout from which a fluid is discharged)

Holonyms ("spout" is a part of...):

pipage; pipe; piping (a long tube made of metal or plastic that is used to carry water or oil or gas etc.)

watering can; watering pot (a container with a handle and a spout with a perforated nozzle; used to sprinkle water over plants)

Derivation:

spout (gush forth in a sudden stream or jet)

 II. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Talk in a noisy, excited, or declamatory manner

Synonyms:

jabber; mouth off; rabbit on; rant; rave; spout

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Hypernyms (to "spout" is one way to...):

mouth; speak; talk; utter; verbalise; verbalize (express in speech)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s
Somebody ----s PP

Derivation:

spouter (an obnoxious and foolish and loquacious talker)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Gush forth in a sudden stream or jet

Example:

water gushed forth

Synonyms:

gush; spirt; spout; spurt

Classified under:

Verbs of walking, flying, swimming

Hypernyms (to "spout" is one way to...):

pour (flow in a spurt)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "spout"):

pump (flow intermittently)

blow (spout moist air from the blowhole)

whoosh (gush or squirt out)

Sentence frames:

Something ----s
Something is ----ing PP

Derivation:

spout (an opening that allows the passage of liquids or grain)

spouter (a spouting whale)

spouter (an oil well that is spouting)

Credits

 Context examples: 

The road topped a low hill, and there was a great widespread whitewashed building in front of us, spouting fire at every chink and window, while in the garden in front three fire-engines were vainly striving to keep the flames under.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The veins and arteries spouted up such a prodigious quantity of blood, and so high in the air, that the great jet d’eau at Versailles was not equal to it for the time it lasted: and the head, when it fell on the scaffold floor, gave such a bounce as made me start, although I was at least half an English mile distant.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

Nobody is fonder of the exercise of talent in young people, or promotes it more, than my father, and for anything of the acting, spouting, reciting kind, I think he has always a decided taste.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

I have seen, he said, the most beautiful scenes of my own country; I have visited the lakes of Lucerne and Uri, where the snowy mountains descend almost perpendicularly to the water, casting black and impenetrable shades, which would cause a gloomy and mournful appearance were it not for the most verdant islands that relieve the eye by their gay appearance; I have seen this lake agitated by a tempest, when the wind tore up whirlwinds of water and gave you an idea of what the water-spout must be on the great ocean; and the waves dash with fury the base of the mountain, where the priest and his mistress were overwhelmed by an avalanche and where their dying voices are still said to be heard amid the pauses of the nightly wind; I have seen the mountains of La Valais, and the Pays de Vaud; but this country, Victor, pleases me more than all those wonders.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

Instead of the classical model of a volcano with a large magma chamber beneath, the researchers say that instead, it’s more like a volcanic ‘plumbing system’ extending through the crust with lots of small ‘spouts’ where magma can be quickly transferred to the surface.

(‘Crystal clocks’ used to time magma storage before volcanic eruptions, University of Cambridge)

But Leach took it quite calmly, though blood was spouting upon the deck as generously as water from a fountain.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

Major staggered to his feet, but the blood spouting from his throat reddened the snow in a widening path.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

She wanted to lean toward this burning, blazing man that was like a volcano spouting forth strength, robustness, and health.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

From the side of the hill, which was here steep and stony, a spout of gravel was dislodged and fell rattling and bounding through the trees.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

I stood in a window, and looked across the ancient street at the opposite houses, recalling how I had watched them on wet afternoons, when I first came there; and how I had used to speculate about the people who appeared at any of the windows, and had followed them with my eyes up and down stairs, while women went clicking along the pavement in pattens, and the dull rain fell in slanting lines, and poured out of the water-spout yonder, and flowed into the road.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)