Definitions

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

  • noun A ridge of sand forming a mound, shoal, or hillside.

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

  • noun A ridge of sand along a shore that is partially or totally submerged and thus a hazard to shipping.

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

  • noun a submerged bank of sand near a shore or in a river; can be exposed at low tide

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From sand +‎ bank. Compare Dutch zandbank ("sandbank, shoal"), German Sandbank ("sandbank, sandbar, shoal"), Swedish sandbank ("sandbank, bar").

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Examples

  • Grainger saw that on the sandbank were a number of dead fish which had been swept down the creek from pools higher up.

    "Chinkie's Flat" 1904 Louis Becke 1884

  • Perched upon a sandbank was a regiment of enormous white pelicans of thoughtful and sage-like physiognomy, ranged in a row, as if to watch how we passed the bar.

    Life in Mexico, During a Residence of Two Years in That Country Frances Erskine Inglis 1843

  • Perched upon a sandbank was a regiment of enormous white pelicans of thoughtful and sage-like physiognomy, ranged in a row, as if to watch how we passed the bar.

    Life in Mexico Frances Calder��n de la Barca 1843

  • I have said that there were ten thousand of us that stood hip to hip and shoulder to shoulder on the sandbank.

    YAH! YAH! YAH! 2010

  • The new constituency would stretch from Port Isaac bay in Cornwall to Bideford bar, a sandbank in the Taw-Torridge estuary in Devon.

    Cornwall-Devon boundary may change 2011

  • The Lewis Chessmen, found in a sandbank in 1831 on the Isle of Lewis in Scotland's chilly Outer Hebrides, remain a mystery.

    At Age 850, Still in the Game 2011

  • He makes it to a sandbank, but instead of waiting for help, he swims into the open water, driven by an overpowering impulse: What was happening to him was inexplicable, magical even, but it felt quite natural.

    The Rancher & the Sculptor Sam Sacks 2011

  • Here you'll find a sandbank protected by coral reefs where the water is only about three feet deep and the legend has it that this is where Josephine came to bathe.

    Karen Schaler: Martinique: French Flair Caribbean Style (PHOTOS) Karen Schaler 2011

  • They'll wait until NASA steers Shuttle replacement onto a sandbank and then waltz over to Congress with cheap alternatives which (or so they will tell the politicos) they can have in space within a few short years so long as Uncle Sugar can provide the required $$$.

    Not Closing the Gap - NASA Watch 2009

  • The brown sandbank is hard and firm, and the ocean water is soupy in the hot August sun.

    Rocky Kistner: To the End of the Bayou; a Gulf Memory for Our Kids Rocky Kistner 2011

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