load

A burden; a weight to be carried.

Noun

  1. A burden; a weight to be carried.
    • I struggled up the hill with the heavy load in my rucksack.
  2. A worry or concern to be endured, especially in the phrase a load off one's mind.
    • Our life's a load. - 1700, [John] Dryden, “Palamon and Arcite: Or, The Knight’s Tale. In Three Books.”, in Fables Ancient and Modern; […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:
    • I came here with a load and it feels so much lighter, now I’ve met you. - 2005, Coldplay, Green Eyes:
  3. A certain number of articles or quantity of material that can be transported or processed at one time.
    • The truck overturned while carrying a full load of oil.
    • She put another load of clothes in the washing machine.
  4. A quantity of washing put into a washing machine for a wash cycle.
    • I put a load on before we left.

    Synonyms: washload

  5. Used to form nouns that indicate a large quantity, often corresponding to the capacity of a vehicle
  6. A large number or amount.
    • I got loads of presents for my birthday!
    • I got a load of emails about that.

    Synonyms: abundance battalion arseload assload bellyload boatload brimful busload bucketful bucketload butt-ton bumload buttload cartload crapflood crapload deal fuckload fuckton fuckwad gob great deal hantle heap

  7. The volume of work required to be performed.
    • Will our web servers be able to cope with that load?
  8. The force exerted on a structural component such as a beam, girder, cable etc.
    • Each of the cross-members must withstand a tensile load of 1,000 newtons.
  9. The electrical current or power delivered by a device.
    • I'm worried that the load on that transformer will be too high.
  10. A resistive force encountered by a prime mover when performing work.
  11. Any component that draws current or power from an electrical circuit.
    • Connect a second 24-ohm load across the power supply's output terminals.
  12. A unit of measure for various quantities.
    • If this load equals its modern representative, it contains 18 cwt. of dry, 19 of new hay. - 1866, James Edwin Thorold Rogers, A History of Agriculture and Prices in England, volume 1, page 172:

Origin

The sense of “burden” first arose in the 13th century as a secondary meaning of Middle English lode, loade, which had the main significance of “way, course, journey”, from Old English lād (“course, journey; way, street, waterway; leading, carrying; maintenance, support”) (ultimately from Proto-Germanic *laidō (“leading, way”), Proto-Indo-European *leyt- (“to go, go forth, die”). Cognate with Middle Low German leide (“entourage, escort”), German Leite (“line, course, load”), Swedish led (“way, trail, line”), Icelandic leið (“way, course, route”). As such, load is a doublet of lode, which has preserved the older meaning. Most likely, the semantic extension of the Middle English substantive arose by conflation with the (etymologically unrelated) verb lade; however, Middle English lode occurs only as a substantive; the transitive verb load (“to charge with a load”) is recorded only in the...

Forms

loads

Synonyms

charge freight fodder fother cartload carrus charrus cumwad wad

Hyponyms

wey fotmal truss

Derived

afterload arkload ark load armload arseload assload axle load axleload backload back load bagload ball load barload barrowload baseload bed load bedload bellyload beload binload bioload bitchload blowing a load blow one's load

Noun Internet, obsolete

  1. A person that spends all day online. The term was originally used in the late 1980s to describe users on free Q-Link (later America Online) accounts who never signed off the system at great expense to the company.
    • She never logs off; she is a real LOAD!

Origin

Acronym of living online all day.

Forms

loads

Verb

  1. To put a load on or in (a means of conveyance or a place of storage).
    • The dock workers refused to load the ship.
  2. To place in or on a conveyance or a place of storage.
    • The longshoremen loaded the cargo quickly.
    • He loaded his stuff into his storage locker.
  3. To put a load on something.
    • The truck was supposed to leave at dawn, but in fact we spent all morning loading.
  4. To receive a load.
    • The truck is designed to load easily.
    • [I]n his Paroxyſms, as he vvalked the Streets, he vvould have his Pockets loaden vvith Stones, to pelt at the Signs. - 1704, [Jonathan Swift], “Section XI. A Tale of a Tub.”, in A Tale of a Tub. […], London: […] John...
  5. To be placed into storage or conveyance.
    • The containers load quickly and easily.
  6. To fill (a firearm or artillery) with munition.
    • I pulled the trigger, but nothing happened. I had forgotten to load the gun.
  7. To insert (an item or items) into an apparatus so as to ready it for operation, such as a reel of film into a camera, sheets of paper into a printer etc.
    • Now that you've loaded the film [into the camera], you're ready to start shooting.
    • Now that you've loaded the camera [with film], you're ready to start shooting.
  8. To fill (an apparatus) with raw material.
    • The workers loaded the blast furnace with coke and ore.
  9. To be put into use in an apparatus.
    • The cartridge was designed to load easily.
  10. To read (data or a program) from a storage medium into computer memory.
    • Click OK to load the selected data.
  11. To transfer from a storage medium into computer memory.
    • The file took ten minutes to load.
    • This program takes an age to load.
  12. To put runners on first, second and third bases
    • He walks to load the bases.

Forms

loads loading loaded loaden

Derived

autoload carbo-load deload gut load loadability loadable load-and-go loader load out load up load up on lock and load misload preload quickload reload underload unload