Shipload

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The quantity of goods or number of people that a ship can carry or has carried at one time
2. As much cargo or as many passengers as a ship is able to transport in a single voyage
3. The full complement of freight or people aboard a vessel for transport

Etymology: "Shipload" is a plain compound of "ship" and "load". Its history is simple: the first element is the Old English "scip", meaning a vessel, and the second is "lade", "load", which in the sense of a burden or quantity of goods goes back to Old English as well. Joined together, they name the amount of cargo a ship carries, a sense that has stayed almost unchanged from the start. The word's meaning follows the literal sense of its parts. A shipload is whatever a ship can hold or has been loaded with, and the term is often used loosely for any large quantity, as in "a shipload of grain" or "a shipload of tourists," where the vessel is a measuring unit rather than the thing itself.

Synonyms: cargo, freight, load