1. sing. and pl. A gate or gates that may be opened or closed, to admit or exclude water, esp. the water of a flood; spec. the lower gates of a lock.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 167/2. Flodegate of a mylle, sinoglocitorium.
1519. Churchw. Acc. St. Giles, Reading, 3. For a tent next the fflode gatis in the North side of the said mill lane.
1677. Plot, Oxfordsh., 233. There are placed a great pair of Folding doors, or Flood-gates of Timber cross the river.
1769. Falconer, Dict. Marine (1789). Basin of a dock, a place where the water is confined by double flood-gates.
1781. Chambers’ Cycl., s.v. Lock or Weir, Lock is … a kind of canal inclosed between two gates; the upper called by workmen the sluice-gate, and the lower called the flood-gate.
1838. Lardner, Hydrost. etc., iv. 66. The water in the higher level A B, is confined by a floodgate, B C, which may be opened and closed at pleasure.
b. transf. and fig. chiefly in expressions relating to rain or tears.
a. 1225. Ancr. R., 72. Hwon ȝe nede moten speken a lutewiht, leseð up ower muðes flodȝeten, ase me deð et ter mulne, and leted adun sone.
1548. Hall, Chron., Hen. VI., 158 b. To set open the fludde gates of these devises, it was thought necessary, to cause some great comocion and rysyng of people to be made against the king.
1592. Shaks., Ven. & Ad., 959.
| But through the floud-gates breaks the siluer rain, | |
| And with his strong course opens them againe. |
1607. Hieron, Wks., I. 89. If you aske what iudgement is due to this offence of not regarding the great things of Gods Law: I answer, in generall, it setteth open the very floudgate of Gods wrath.
a. 1656. Bp. Hall, Rem., Wks. (1660), 109. Let no Antinomian stop the floodgates of our eyes.
1663. Cowley, Disc. O. Cromwell (1669), 67. It is God that breaks up the Flood-Gates of so general a Deluge, and all the Art then and Industry of Mankind is not sufficient to raise up Dikes and Ramparts against it.
1781. Cowper, Convers., 263.
| When wine has given indecent language birth, | |
| And forc’d the flood-gates of licentious mirth. |
1848. Thackeray, Van. Fair, xxvi. How the floodgates were opened, and mother and daughter wept, when they were together embracing each other in this sanctuary, may readily be imagined by every reader who possesses the least sentimental turn.
2. a. A sluice. b. dial. (see quot. 1886).
1559. A. Andrison, in W. Boys, Sandwich (1792), 739. The wheales and other necessaryes for the drawenge up of the fludgates.
1870. Spurgeon, Treas. Dav., Ps. v. 3. We should be careful to keep the stream of meditation always running; for this is the water to drive the mill of prayer. It is idle to pull up the flood-gates of a dry brook, and then hope to see the wheel revolve.
1888. Elworthy, W. Somerset Word-bk., Flood-gate, a gate hung upon a pole across a stream, so that in flood-time it rises and falls by floating on the water. Its purpose is not to obstruct the water, but to prevent cattle passing when the water is low.
† 3. The stream that is closed by or passes through a flood-gate; a strong stream, a torrent. Also transf. and fig. Obs.
1388. Wyclif, Job xxxvi. 27. Which takith awei the dropis of reyn; and schedith out reynes at the licnesse of floodȝatis.
1533. Act 25 Hen. VIII., c. 7. Take … in fludgate, salmon-pipe, or at the tayle of any mylle or were … the young fry … of … salmon.
1590. Spenser, F. Q., II. i. 43.
| Out of her gored wound the cruell steele | |
| He lightly snatcht, and did the floudgate stop | |
| With his faire garment. |
1651. C. Cartwright, Certamen Religiosum, I. 22. My Lord, you let a flood-gate of Arguments out, against my naked breast.
b. attrib. passing into adj.
1604. Shaks., Oth., I. iii. 56.
| For my perticular griefe | |
| Is of so flood-gate, and ore-bearing Nature, | |
| That it engluts, and swallowes other sorrowes, | |
| And it is still it selfe. |
4. Comb., as flood-gate iron (see quot. 1833).
1783. in Boswell, Johnson (1848), 721/2. ‘Sir,’ said he, ‘I am the great Twalmley, who invented the New Floodgate Iron.’
1833. J. Holland, Manuf. Metal, II. 253. The second [box-iron] is made hollow, for the reception of a heater; and with reference to the contrivance by which the heater is shut in, has been called the floodgate iron.
