Word.ws English Dictionary

leat

/liːt/

leat noun: an artificial watercourse, canal, or aqueduct, but especially a millrace.

Noun

leat (plural leats)

  1. An artificial watercourse, canal, or aqueduct, but especially a millrace.
    • His paws rested on a sunken branch. The water moved down, clouded with the mud-stirrings of the leat. He lay so still that the trout returned to their stances beside the stone sterlings.1927, Henry William Williamson, Tarka the Otter, Chapter 19

Forms of leat

pluralleats
alternative formleet

Origin of leat

Probably from Middle English lete (“a meeting or intersection of roads; junction; crossroads; conduit”), from Old English ġelǣte (“a going out, ending, meeting”), as in Old English wæterġelǣt (“watercourse, aquaduct”), from Proto-Germanic *lētą, *galētą (“a letting, a letting out”). Cognate with Old High German gilāz (“outlet, exit, end, road junction”), German Gelaß (“back room, recess, private chamber”). Related to English let.

Words formed from leat

Questions about leat

What does leat mean?
Leat means an artificial watercourse, canal, or aqueduct, but especially a millrace.
What part of speech is leat?
Leat is a noun.
How do you pronounce leat?
Leat is pronounced /liːt/.
What is the plural of leat?
The plural of leat is leats.

Words near leat in the dictionary

  1. leastwise
  2. leasure
  3. leasurely
  4. Leasures
  5. leasy
  6. leat
  7. Leath
  8. Leatham
  9. Leathams
  10. leather
  11. leather and prunella

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: leat (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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