culvert

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a covered channel or pipe that carries water beneath a road, railway, or embankment

   Storm water rushed through the culvert beneath the road.

2. 2
   verb

   to channel a stream or watercourse through a culvert

   Engineers culverted the stream where the new railway crossed the valley.

Recorded in English from the late eighteenth century, but of uncertain origin. Proposed sources include French couvert, 'covered,' and an unrecorded Dutch compound associated with flowing water and a channel; none is securely established.

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