WHARF (wharves)

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

Irregular inflected form: wharves   

 Dictionary entry overview: What does wharf mean? 

• WHARF (noun)
  The noun WHARF has 1 sense:

1. a platform built out from the shore into the water and supported by piles; provides access to ships and boats

  Familiarity information: WHARF used as a noun is very rare.

• WHARF (verb)
  The verb WHARF has 5 senses:

1. provide with a wharf

2. store on a wharf

3. discharge at a wharf

4. come into or dock at a wharf

5. moor at a wharf

  Familiarity information: WHARF used as a verb is common.

 Dictionary entry details 

• WHARF (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A platform built out from the shore into the water and supported by piles; provides access to ships and boats

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Synonyms:

dock; pier; wharf; wharfage

Hypernyms ("wharf" is a kind of...):

platform (a raised horizontal surface)

Meronyms (parts of "wharf"):

bitt; bollard (a strong post (as on a wharf or quay or ship for attaching mooring lines))

shipside (the part of a wharf that is next to a ship)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "wharf"):

levee (a pier that provides a landing place on a river)

quay (wharf usually built parallel to the shoreline)

Derivation:

wharf (moor at a wharf)

wharf (come into or dock at a wharf)

wharf (discharge at a wharf)

wharf (store on a wharf)

wharf (provide with a wharf)

• WHARF (verb)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Provide with a wharf

Classified under:

Verbs of buying, selling, owning

Context example:

Wharf the mouth of the river

Hypernyms (to "wharf" is one way to...):

furnish; provide; render; supply (give something useful or necessary to)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Derivation:

wharf; wharfage (a platform built out from the shore into the water and supported by piles; provides access to ships and boats)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Store on a wharf

Classified under:

Verbs of buying, selling, owning

Context example:

Wharf the merchandise

Hypernyms (to "wharf" is one way to...):

store (find a place for and put away for storage)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Derivation:

wharf (a platform built out from the shore into the water and supported by piles; provides access to ships and boats)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Discharge at a wharf

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Context example:

wharf the passengers

Hypernyms (to "wharf" is one way to...):

discharge; drop; drop off; put down; set down; unload (remove (cargo, people, etc.) from and leave)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Derivation:

wharf (a platform built out from the shore into the water and supported by piles; provides access to ships and boats)

Sense 4

Meaning:

Come into or dock at a wharf

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Synonyms:

berth; moor; wharf

Context example:

the big ship wharfed in the evening

Hypernyms (to "wharf" is one way to...):

dock (come into dock)

Sentence frame:

Something ----s

Derivation:

wharf (a platform built out from the shore into the water and supported by piles; provides access to ships and boats)

Sense 5

Meaning:

Moor at a wharf

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Context example:

The ship was wharfed

Hypernyms (to "wharf" is one way to...):

berth; moor; tie up (secure in or as if in a berth or dock)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Derivation:

wharf (a platform built out from the shore into the water and supported by piles; provides access to ships and boats)

 Context examples 

I suppose I looked uncertain, for he went on hastily: “You have heard the “counting-house” mentioned, or the business, or the cellars, or the wharf, or something about it.”

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

The front room was plainly furnished as a sitting-room and led into a small bedroom, which looked out upon the back of one of the wharves.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

From the deck of the Mariposa, at the sailing hour, he saw Lizzie Connolly hiding in the skirts of the crowd on the wharf.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

My friends of the thirst and the language that was of bloom and blood laughed, as they told how the captain's swears exceeded even his usual polyglot, and was more than ever full of picturesque, when on questioning other mariners who were on movement up and down on the river that hour, he found that few of them had seen any of fog at all, except where it lay round the wharf.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

There is a fierce eddy between the wharf and the house.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

There were neither wharves nor houses on the melancholy waste of road near the great blank Prison.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Between the wharf and the bedroom window is a narrow strip, which is dry at low tide but is covered at high tide with at least four and a half feet of water.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The Orfling met me here sometimes, to be told some astonishing fictions respecting the wharves and the Tower; of which I can say no more than that I hope I believed them myself.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Upper Swandam Lane is a vile alley lurking behind the high wharves which line the north side of the river to the east of London Bridge.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

It was a crazy old house with a wharf of its own, abutting on the water when the tide was in, and on the mud when the tide was out, and literally overrun with rats.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)