launder

English

WOTD – 5 October 2007

English Wikipedia has an article on:

launder

Wikipedia

Etymology

Contracted from Middle English lavender, from Old French lavandiere, from Late Latin lavandena, from Latin lavō (“I wash”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈlɔːndə/
• (some accents) IPA^(key): /ˈlɑːndə(ɹ)/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈlɔndɚ/
• (cot–caught merger) IPA^(key): /ˈlɑndɚ/

  • Audio (US):

    (file)

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔːndə(ɹ), -ɑːndə(ɹ)

Noun

launder (plural launders)

1. (obsolete) A washerwoman or washerman.
2. (mining) A trough used by miners to receive powdered ore from the box where it is beaten, or for carrying water to the stamps, or other apparatus for comminuting (sorting) the ore.
3. A trough or channel carrying water to the wheel of a watermill.

   Synonym: inlayer

4. A gutter (for rainwater).

Synonyms

• (washerwoman): launderer, laundress, washerwoman

Translations

washerwoman — see washerwoman

trough used by miners to carry material

Bulgarian: корито за промиване n (korito za promivane) Finnish: ränni (fi)

trough or channel carrying water to the wheel of a watermill

Finnish: ränni (fi)

gutter for rainwater — see gutter

Verb

launder (third-person singular simple present launders, present participle laundering, simple past and past participle laundered)

1. To wash; to wash, and to smooth with a flatiron or mangle; to wash and iron.
2. (obsolete) To lave; to wet.
   • 1609, William Shakespeare, “A Louers Complaint”, in Shake-speares Sonnets. […], London: By G[eorge] Eld for T[homas] T[horpe] and are to be sold by William Aspley, →OCLC:

     Oft did she heave her napkin to her eyne, / Which on it had conceited characters, / Laundering the silken figures in the brine

4. (money) To disguise the source of (ill-gotten wealth) by various means.
5. (programming, transitive) To obtain a pointer to an object created in storage occupied by an existing object of the same type, even if it has const or reference members.

Derived terms

• money laundering

Translations

to wash and iron

Azerbaijani: yumaq (az) Bulgarian: пера (bg) (pera) Catalan: rentar (ca), fer la bugada Chinese: Mandarin: 洗 (zh) Crimean Tatar: yuvmaq Finnish: pyykätä ja silittää French: blanchir (fr) German: waschen (de) Latin: lavō (la) Malay: mencuci,​ membasuh​ Polish: prać (pl), uprać Portuguese: lavar (pt) Spanish: lavar (es), hacer la colada Thai: ซักอบรีด (sák-òp-rîit) Ukrainian: пра́ти impf (práty), ви́прати pf (výpraty)

to wet

Latin: lavō (la)

to disguise the source of

Azerbaijani: yumaq (az) Bulgarian: пера (bg) (pera) Catalan: blanquejar (ca) Chinese: Mandarin: please add this translation if you can Finnish: pestä (fi) German: waschen (de) Hungarian: pénzt mos Khmer: លាង (km) (liəng) Malay: melabur secara haram Norwegian: Bokmål: hvitvaske Portuguese: branquear (pt) Russian: отмывать (ru) (otmyvatʹ) Thai: ฟอก (th) (fɔ̂ɔk) Ukrainian: відмива́ти impf (vidmyváty), відми́ти pf (vidmýty) Vietnamese: please add this translation if you can

Related terms

• launderer
• launderette
• laundress
• laundry
• lave

References

• “launder”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “launder”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

Anagrams

• Arundel, lurdane, rundale

Middle English

Noun

launder

1. Alternative form of lavender