-gate
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-gate
suff.
A scandal involving alleged illegal acts and often a cover-up, especially by government officials: Irangate.
[After Watergate.]
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
-gate
n combining form
indicating a person or thing that has been the cause of, or is associated with, a public scandal: Irangate; Camillagate.
[C20: on the analogy of Watergate]
Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014
gate1
(geɪt)n., v. gat•ed, gat•ing. n.
1. a movable barrier, usu. on hinges, closing an opening in a fence, wall, or other enclosure.
2. an opening permitting passage through an enclosure.
3. a tower, architectural setting, etc., for defending or adorning such an opening or for providing a monumental entrance to a street, park, etc.
4. any means of access or entrance: the gate to success.
5. a mountain pass.
6. any movable barrier, as at a tollbooth or a railroad crossing.
8. a gateway or passageway in a passenger terminal or pier that leads to a place for boarding a train, plane, or ship.
9. a sliding barrier for regulating the passage of water, steam, or the like, as in a dam or pipe; valve.
10.
a. an obstacle in a slalom race, consisting of two upright poles anchored in the snow a certain distance apart.
b. the opening between these poles, through which a competitor in a slalom race must ski.
11. the total number of persons who pay for admission to an athletic contest, a performance, an exhibition, etc.
12. the total receipts from such admissions.
13. a temporary channel in a cell membrane through which substances diffuse into or out of a cell.
14. a circuit with one output that is actuated only by certain combinations of two or more inputs.
15. the gate, rejection; dismissal: to give a boyfriend the gate.
v.t. 16. (at British universities) to punish by confining to the college grounds.
17. to control the operation of (an electronic device) by means of a gate.
[before 900; Old English geat (pl. gatu), c. Old Frisian gat hole, Old Saxon: eye of a needle; compare gate2]
gate2
(geɪt)n.
Archaic. a path; way.
[1150–1200; Middle English < Old Norse gata path]
-gate
a combining form extracted from Watergate, occurring as the final element in journalistic coinages, usu. nonce words, that name scandals resulting from concealed crime or other improprieties in government or business: Irangate.
Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary, © 2010 K Dictionaries Ltd. Copyright 2005, 1997, 1991 by Random House, Inc. All rights reserved.