[GATE sb.1]
† 1. A sluice or floodgate. Obs.
1408. in Eng. Hist. Rev. (1899), XIV. 517. Les spowtes lignea ducentia aquam a dicto Watergate usque dictam rotam.
1458–9. Memorials of Fountains (Surtees), III. 58. Pro factura le Wateryattes per Th. bute in fontans fell. ij s.
1577. Reg. Mag. Sig. Scot., 748/2. The syd of the puill foranent the watter yet of the Hauch of Dalkeith.
1585. Higins, Junius’ Nomencl., 391/1. Emissarium,… a floud gate: a watergate: a sluce: a waire.
1755. Johnson, Sluice,… watergate; a floodgate.
b. transf. and fig.
1390. Gower, Conf., I. 302. After that withinne a throwe He reyneth and the watergates Undoth. Ibid., I. 312. Fro hevene out of the watergates The reyni Storm fell down algates.
c. 1440. Jacob’s Well, 217. Þe v. watyr-gatys of ȝoure pytt arn ȝoure v. bodyly wyttes, as crisostom seyth…. Þise ben þe v. watyr-gatys, þe fyve entrees wherby watyr of curse & wose of synne entryn aȝen in-to þi pytt of lustys, but þei be stoppyd.
1606. Sylvester, Du Bartas, II. iv. II. Magnif., 1241. If, with ten-fold chain, Thy hand hath lockt the Water-gates of Rain.
1719. D’Urfey, Pills, II. 25. To open well her Water-gate, and best supply her Mill.
2. A gate (of a town, a castle, etc.) giving access to the water-side.
c. 1380. Sir Ferumb., 4651. Þan was þar a geant ful of pryde, And openede þe water-gate wyde, Ys name was enfachoun.
a. 1400. Sir Perc., 918. In at a watur-ȝate, Ther men vytayled by bate That castel with cornes.
1577–87. Holinshed, Chron., III. 1135/2. The curteine betwixt the watergate and the soldiers prison on the wall.
1624. Middleton, Game at Chess, III. i. 50. Pack up my plate and goods, and steal away By night at water-gate.
1679. Prance, Narr. Popish Plot, 9. The Watergate (as they call it, that is the furthermost Gate or Passage going down out of the Strand to the Waterside) of Sommerset-House.
1722. De Foe, Col. Jack (1840), 225. Two … regiments … kept possession of the water-gate … of the town.
1867. Morris, Jason, VII. 123. She came down to a gilded water-gate, Which with a golden key she opened straight.
1911. G. M. Trevelyan, Garibaldi & Making of Italy, vii. 165. On the same evening the last of the Bourbons and his queen were leaving the Palace of Naples by the water-gate and taking ship for Gaeta.
b. A gate through which supplies of water are brought.
1535. Coverdale, Neh. viii. 3. In the strete that is before the Watergate.
3. A place through which water-traffic passes.
1893. F. Adams, New Egypt, 90. It is strange … to find that a short passage up a series of rapids has brought you … among a people almost as different from the people … of Egypt…. This water-gate is an absolute division, ethnologically as well as geologically.
1907. A. J. Phillips (title), Gravesend: the Water-gate of London.
