ingot

Meanings

1. A solid block of more or less pure metal, often but not necessarily bricklike in shape and trapezoidal in cross-section, the result of pouring out and cooling molten metal, often immediately after smelting from raw ore or alloying from constituents.

1. To form (scraps of metal) into ingots.

Etymology

From Middle English ingot (“mould for casting metal”), of uncertain origin. In all likelihood the same word as Middle French lingot, but the direction of borrowing is hard to establish, particularly as the word appears simultaneously (ca. 1390) in both languages. * Assuming English origin, from Old English ingoten, past participle of inġēotan (“to pour in”), derived from Proto-Germanic *geutaną (“to pour”, whence archaic English yote). Compare Old English ingyte (“a pouring-in, infusion”), which is formed with a related noun (Proto-Germanic *gutiz, whence German Guss, Swedish göt). Also related with English gote, goit. * Assuming French origin, from a diminutive of Old Occitan lenga (“tongue”), so called because of the elongated form. (The presence or absence of initial l- has to do, in any case, with rebracketing of the French definite article.)