Definitions

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

  • noun Any of various machines equipped with scooping or suction devices and used to deepen harbors and waterways and in underwater mining.
  • noun Nautical A boat or barge equipped with a dredge.
  • noun An implement consisting of a net on a frame, used for gathering shellfish.
  • intransitive verb To clean, deepen, or widen with a dredge.
  • intransitive verb To bring up with a dredge.
  • intransitive verb To come up with; unearth.
  • intransitive verb To use a dredge.
  • transitive verb To coat (food) by sprinkling with a powder, such as flour or sugar.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A bush-harrow; a large rake.
  • noun Any instrument for bringing up or removing solid substances from under water by dragging on the bottom.
  • noun An apparatus for bringing up marine animals, plants, and other objects from the bottom of the sea for scientific investigation. It consists principally of a frame of iron and a net which is attached to the frame. As generally constructed, the frame is transversely oblong, generally about three times as long as wide, with straight ends and slightly inclined sides, having the outer edges sharp to serve as scrapers. The net is usually composed of heavy twine, but sometimes of iron chainwork, and is attached to the frame by holes near the inner edges. Fastened to the frame are iron handles, to which a rope or iron chain is attached.
  • noun A machine for clearing the beds of canals, rivers, harbors, etc. See dredging-machine.
  • noun In ore-dressing, in certain mining districts of England, ore which is intermediate in rich ness between “prill-ore”; and “halvans”; ore of second quality, more or less intermixed with veinstone. Sometimes written dradge.
  • noun Formerly, same as meslin; now, specifically, a mixture of oats and barley sown together.
  • To clear out with a dredge; remove sand, silt, mud, etc., from the bottom of: as, to dredge a harbor, river, or canal.
  • To take, catch, or gather with a dredge; obtain or remove by the use of a dredge: as, to dredge mud from a river.
  • To make use of a dredge; operate with a dredge: as, to dredge for oysters.
  • To sprinkle flour upon, as roasting meat.

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

  • noun obsolete A mixture of oats and barley.
  • transitive verb To sift or sprinkle flour, etc., on, as on roasting meat.
  • transitive verb (Gun.) A copper box with a perforated lid; -- used for sprinkling meal powder over shell fuses.
  • transitive verb To catch or gather with a dredge; to deepen with a dredging machine.
  • transitive verb a machine (commonly on a boat) used to scoop up mud, gravel, or obstructions from the bottom of rivers, docks, etc., so as to deepen them.
  • noun Any instrument used to gather or take by dragging; as: (a) A dragnet for taking up oysters, etc., from their beds. (b) A dredging machine. (c) An iron frame, with a fine net attached, used in collecting animals living at the bottom of the sea.
  • noun (Mining) Very fine mineral matter held in suspension in water.

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

  • noun Any instrument used to gather or take by dragging; as:
  • noun Very fine mineral matter held in suspension in water.
  • verb to make a channel deeper or wider using a dredge
  • verb to bring something to the surface with a dredge
  • verb to unearth, such as an unsavoury past
  • verb to coat moistened food with a powder, such as flour or sugar

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

  • noun a power shovel to remove material from a channel or riverbed
  • verb cover before cooking
  • verb search (as the bottom of a body of water) for something valuable or lost
  • verb remove with a power shovel, usually from a bottom of a body of water

Etymologies

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

[Middle English dreg- (in dreg-boat, boat for dredging); akin to ; akin to Old English dragan, to draw.]

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

[From obsolete dredge, a sweetmeat, from Middle English dragge, from Old French dragie, alteration of Latin tragēmata, confectionary, from Greek, pl. of tragēma, sweetmeat; see terə- in Indo-European roots.]

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Examples

  • And the dry-wet-dry dredge is messy enough, I can't imagine even more of a disaster!

    Independence and chicken-fried steak | Homesick Texan Homesick Texan 2007

  • Outside he can dredge from a boat at his service; or swim and rest in the sun to go back invigorated into his laboratory.

    Runner of the Mountain Tops: The Life of Louis Agassiz 1939

  • The dredge is actually working between the Thetis and the sand.

    The Fight at Zeebrugge 1919

  • For instance, in Bear Creek the dredge is built right near the side of the creek and digs out a hole for itself, and the water sweeps in from the side and forms a pool around it, and then it can be handled from the dredge in any way that is required.

    Position and Prospects of the Yukon 1906

  • ... a ride on a specially restored tin dredge (with costumed Mat Salleh bosses to shout at everyone) ...

    The Harmony Silk Factory Tour of Perak Sharon Bakar 2005

  • ... a ride on a specially restored tin dredge (with costumed Mat Salleh bosses to shout at everyone) ...

    Archive 2005-06-01 Sharon Bakar 2005

  • His dredge was the first of the four, moored by chains on both sides of both ends.

    Morgan’s Run Colleen McCullough 2000

  • His dredge was the first of the four, moored by chains on both sides of both ends.

    Morgan’s Run Colleen McCullough 2000

  • Acting Assistant Paymaster J.W. Sands and myself, as to the propriety of steaming down the river without dredging it, it was agreed upon to call the dredge-boats in, and we proceeded down the river, shelling the woods on right bank of the river and then came to an anchor above

    Reminiscences of Two Years in the United States Navy 1876

  • He called dredge mining a "great economic benefit to the county."

    Siskiyou Daily News Homepage RSS 2009

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