A structure or platform of timber, masonry, iron, earth, or other material, built on the shore of a harbor, river, canal, or the like, and usually extending from the shore to deep water, so that vessels may lie close alongside to receive and discharge cargo, passengers, etc.; a quay; a pier. Commerce pushes its wharves into the sea. Bancroft. Out upon the wharfs they came, Knight and burgher, lord and dame. Tennyson.
The bank of a river, or the shore of the sea. [Obs.] "The fat weed that roots itself in ease on Lethe wharf." Shak. Wharf boat, a kind of boat moored at the bank of a river, and used for a wharf, in places where the height of the water is so variable that a fixed wharf would be useless. [U. S.] Bartlett. -- Wharf rat. (Zoöl.) (a) The common brown rat. (b) A neglected boy who lives around the wharfs. [Slang]
To guard or secure by a firm wall of timber or stone constructed like a wharf; to furnish with a wharf or wharfs.
To place upon a wharf; to bring to a wharf.
98,828 entries. Headwords are matched first, then definition text.