English

Noun

smelt ‎(plural smelts)

1. Any small anadromous fish of the family Osmeridae, found in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans and in lakes in North America and northern part of Europe.
2. (obsolete) A fool; a simpleton.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Beaumont and Fletcher to this entry?)

Translations

Etymology 2

From very early Middle English smel; likely to derive from Old English, but not recorded.

Verb

smelt

1. simple past tense and past participle of smell

Etymology 3

From Middle Dutch smelten ‎(“to melt”) or Middle Low German smelten ‎(“to melt”), both from Proto-Germanic *smeltaną ‎(“to melt”). Related to Old English meltan ‎(“to melt”). Cognate to Dutch smelten, German schmelzen.

Noun

smelt ‎(plural smelts)

1. Production of metal, especially iron, from ore in a process that involves melting and chemical reduction of metal compounds into purified metal.
2. Any of the various liquids or semi-molten solids produced and used during the course of such production.
   • 1982, Raymond E. Kirk and Donald F. Othmer, Encyclopedia of Chemical Technology, Wiley, ISBN 0471020729, page 405,

     The green liquor, ie, [sic] the solution obtained on dissolving the smelt, contains an insoluble residue called dregs, which gives it a dark green appearance.

   • 1996, Arthur J. Wilson, The Living Rock: The Story of Metals Since Earliest Time and Their Impact on Civilization,

     When the smelt was complete the crucible could be lifted out and the metal poured directly into the moulds, thus avoiding the need to break it up and remelt […]

   • 2000, Julian Henderson, The Science and Archaeology of Materials: An Investigation of Inorganic Materials,

     […] can vary in different positions in the furnace and during the smelt.

     Furnaces are unlikely to survive the smelts; all that often remains on metal production sites is just furnace bases and broken fragments of furnaces […]

   • 2002, Jenny Moore, “Who Lights the Fire? Gender and the Energy of Production”, in Moira Donald and Linda Hurcombe (eds.), Gender and Material Culture in Archaeological Perspective, Palgrave Macmillan, ISBN 0312223986, page 130,

     Women are allowed to play some small part in the smelt if they are breastfeeding or post-menopausal (van der Merwe and Avery, 1988).

Quotations

• For usage examples of this term, see Citations:smelt.

Translations

Verb

smelt ‎(third-person singular simple present smelts, present participle smelting, simple past and past participle smelted)

1. to fuse or melt two things into one, especially in order to extract metal from ore; to meld

Translations

Anagrams

• melts

Dutch

Pronunciation

Noun

smelt m ‎(uncountable)

1. melt

Verb

smelt

1. first-, second- and third-person singular present indicative of smelten
2. imperative of smelten

Norwegian Bokmål

Verb

smelt

1. imperative of smelte