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land

(lănd)

1. The solid ground of the earth.

a. Ground or soil: tilled the land.

b. A topographically or functionally distinct tract: desert land; prime building land.

a. A nation; a country.

b. The people of a nation, district, or region.

c. lands Territorial possessions or property.

4. Public or private landed property; real estate.

5. Law The solid material of the earth as well as the natural and manmade things attached to it and the rights and interests associated with it.

a. An agricultural or farming area: wanted to buy a house on the land.

b. Farming considered as a way of life.

7. An area or realm: the land of make-believe; the land of television.

8. The raised portion of a grooved surface, as on a phonograph record.

v. land·ed, land·ing, lands

v.tr.

a. To bring to and unload on land: land cargo.

b. To set (a vehicle) down on land or another surface: land an airplane smoothly; land a seaplane on a lake.

2. Informal To cause to arrive in a place or condition: Civil disobedience will land you in jail.

a. To catch and pull in (a fish): landed a big catfish.

b. Informal To win; secure: land a big contract.

4. Informal To deliver: landed a blow on his opponent's head.

v.intr.

a. To come to shore: landed against the current with great difficulty.

b. To disembark: landed at a crowded dock.

2. To descend toward and settle onto the ground or another surface: The helicopter has landed.

3. Informal To arrive in a place or condition: landed at the theater too late for the opening curtain; landed in trouble for being late.

4. To come to rest in a certain way or place: slipped and landed on his shoulder.

[Middle English, from Old English; see lendh- in the Appendix of Indo-European roots.]

Land

(lănd), Edwin Herbert 1909-1991.

American inventor who developed (1932) the light-polarizing plastic film called Polaroid and incorporated it into sunglass lenses and photographic filters. He also invented the one-step photographic process (1947).

Indo-European & Semitic Roots Appendices

Thousands of entries in the dictionary include etymologies that trace their origins back to reconstructed proto-languages. You can obtain more information about these forms in our online appendices:

Indo-European Roots

Semitic Roots

The Indo-European appendix covers nearly half of the Indo-European roots that have left their mark on English words. A more complete treatment of Indo-European roots and the English words derived from them is available in our Dictionary of Indo-European Roots.

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