flotsam Hear it!

flotsam definition

flot·sam (flät′səm)

noun

  1. the wreckage of a ship or its cargo floating at sea
  2. odds and ends
  3. unemployed people who drift from place to place

Etymology: Anglo-Fr floteson < OFr flotaison, a floating < floter, to float < MDu vloten (or OE flotian), to float

Webster's New World College Dictionary Copyright © 2009 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Cleveland, Ohio.
Used by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

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