waterworks means the water supply system of a district, town, city, or other place, including reservoirs, pipes, and pumps. Lexicurio rates it Distinctive — a strength score of 65 out of 100.
waterworks is pronounced /ˈwɔːtəˌwəːks/.
Etymology
From water + works (“machine, mechanism; factory or factories”).
noun
- The water supply system of a district, town, city, or other place, including reservoirs, pipes, and pumps.
- Any single facility, such as a filtration plant or pumping station, within such a system.“She is employed by a waterworks at the outskirts of the city.”
- Often in the form turn on the waterworks: crying or tears, especially in a way that is considered manipulative or over-emotional.“She turned on the waterworks when we told her the old man was dead, but she was asking questions about the will soon enough.”
- Rain.
- The genitourinary system.
- A hydraulic apparatus by which a supply of water is furnished for ornamental purposes; also, an ornamental fountain or waterfall.“Resolving to possess myself in some quiet if it might be, in a time of so great jealosy, I built by my Brother's permission a study, made a fishpond, an island, and some other solitudes and retirements, at Wotton, which gave the first occasion of improving them to those water-works and gardens which afterwards succeeded them.”