noun, plural ferries. 1. a commercial service with terminals and boats for transporting persons, automobiles, etc., across a river or other comparatively small body of water. 2. a ferryboat.
Examples and related terms. A loanword is distinguished from a calque (loan translation), which is a word or phrase whose meaning or idiom is adopted from another language by translation into existing words or word-forming roots of the recipient language.
(spÉl) vb, spells, spelling, spelt or spelled. 1. to write or name in correct order the letters that comprise the conventionally accepted form of (a word or part of a word) 2. (tr) (of letters) to go to make up the conventionally established form of (a word) when arranged correctly: d-o-g spells dog. 3. (tr) to indicate or signify: such actions spell disaster for our cause.