Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Soil composed of a mixture of sand, clay, silt, and organic matter.
- n. A mixture of moist clay and sand, and often straw, used especially in making bricks and foundry molds.
- v. To fill, cover, or coat with loam.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A soil consisting of a natural mixture of clay and sand, the latter being present in sufficient quantity to overcome the tendency of the clay to form a coherent mass. That which is ordinarily called loam is fine-grained, homogeneous, and “light”—that is, not densely compacted together. Carbonate of lime is usually present in small quantity, and also organic matter. See
marl , soil, and loess. - n. In founding, a mixture of sand, clay, sawdust, straw, etc., used in making the molds for castings. The compound must be plastic when wet, and hard, air-tight, and able to resist high temperatures when dry. Specifically called casting-loam.
- n. A vessel of clay; an earthen vessel.
- To cover or coat with loam; clay.
Wiktionary
- n. A kind of soil; an earthy mixture of clay and sand, with organic matter to which its fertility is chiefly due.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. A kind of soil; an earthy mixture of clay and sand, with organic matter to which its fertility is chiefly due.
- n. A mixture of sand, clay, and other materials, used in making molds for large castings, often without a pattern.
- v. To cover, smear, or fill with loam.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a rich soil consisting of a mixture of sand and clay and decaying organic materials
Etymologies
- Middle English lam, lom, clay, from Old English lām; see lei- in Indo-European roots.
Examples
“The term loam is applied to a soil which, from its appearance in the field and the feeling when handled, appears to be about one-half sand and the other half silt and clay with more or less organic matter.”
“It's the top spit that puzzles us, and loam is the most important thing of all.”
“Ash of the loam was a lady at home when Brut was an outlaw man”
“We can easily see that the melting away of the immense glaciers that we have been describing would produce vast floods in the rivers, and it is perhaps owing to the presence of such swollen rivers that are due the great beds of surface soil, called loam or loess, found in all the river valleys of France and Germany.”
“The soil is a rich sandy loam, that is easily cultivated and gives promise of great agricultural and horticultural possibilities.”
The Choctaw Freedmen and The Story of Oak Hill Industrial Academy
“In early fall I get together a pile of fresh sod loam, that is, the top spit from a pasture field, but do not add any manure to it.”
Mushrooms: how to grow them a practical treatise on mushroom culture for profit and pleasure
“The loam is the ordinary field soil from his market garden.”
Mushrooms: how to grow them a practical treatise on mushroom culture for profit and pleasure
“The clay wherewith our houses are impannelled is either white, red, or blue; and of these the first doth participate very much of the nature of our chalk; the second is called loam; but the third eftsoons changeth colour as soon as it is wrought, notwithstanding that it looks blue when it is thrown out of the pit.”
“The soil varies somewhat in different localities, consisting, however, mainly of a sandy loam, which is very fertile and suited to the growth of any crop which it is desirable to cultivate.”
“The soils are red clay, and a gray sandy loam, which is admirably adapted to the cultivation of tobacco.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘loam’.
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Not edible
Things that sound edible but are not (usually). See Liberty's To Eat, or Not to Eat? for more diet food.
cinnabar, dulcimer, belfries, potto, maltha, grapple, loam, rake, tort, pomade, buffalo chip, wedgie and 165 more...
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#faveword
Words chosen as favorites for the Twitter hashtag #faveword.
autumnal, grotto, chiaroscuro, sfumato, homunculus, zing, zest, effervescent, bewitch, avuncular, susurrus, Styrofoam and 205 more...
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Interesting Words
A list of words that I find cool.
décolleté, ineluctably, pantechnicon, ossary, peripeteia, harridan, recidivist, irremediable, suppuration, slaver, loam, umbrage and 5 more...
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Ancient Influence
Words that inspire a feeling of old and/or mythical influences.
Ogham, sward, willow, hazel, yew, holly, barrow, runes, sepulchre, rill, rivulet, heft and 18 more...
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Words I like
A list contrived for the sole purpose of storing words I like to include in my writing; words that inspire or carry power for me.
contrite, meadow, sward, ossary, calumny, moribund, necropolis, chthonic, murmur, erstwhile, chime, beryl and 29 more...
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Surprising four-letter words
I imagine most of these will be Anglo-Saxon, not likely to crop up in the average day's conversation, and thus excellent for Scrabble. ("most" is too common, likewise "will" and even "crop", in an...
blet, quim, clit, buff, sire, wiki, blog, loam, waft, heft, mare, lilt and 68 more...
ofravens Loam-humps, he says, moles shunt
up from delved worm-haunt
from "Ode for Ted," Sylvia Plath Apr 14, 2008