as in ditches
a deep, wide excavation that is usually filled with water and that goes around the walls of a place (such as a castle) to protect it from being attacked
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Recent Examples of moats
Pitch decks celebrated inbound opportunity counts, and sourcing networks were treated as proprietary moats.
—
Peter Doyle,
Forbes.com,
26 June 2026
Proprietary data, specialised hardware, scientific expertise and difficult-to-reproduce infrastructure are becoming durable moats.
—
Carl Fritjofsson,
Fortune,
19 June 2026
But somebody brought up this idea of moats.
—
Alex Crippen,
CNBC,
13 June 2026
Install an Ant Moat Ant moats are little basins that hold water that are hung below hummingbird feeders.
—
Peg Aloi,
The Spruce,
4 June 2026
In Latin America stadiums have been constructed with anti-hooligan architecture such as high fencing and moats.
—
Gitanjali Roy,
Encyclopedia Britannica,
1 June 2026
This control was reflected in the layout of the site, in which workshop areas–identified by furnaces and bronze artifacts—were enclosed by earthen walls and moats, suggesting oversight and protection.
—
Anne Doran,
ARTnews.com,
8 Apr. 2026
Peter Doyle,
Forbes.com,
26 June 2026
Proprietary data, specialised hardware, scientific expertise and difficult-to-reproduce infrastructure are becoming durable moats.
—
Carl Fritjofsson,
Fortune,
19 June 2026
But somebody brought up this idea of moats.
—
Alex Crippen,
CNBC,
13 June 2026
Install an Ant Moat Ant moats are little basins that hold water that are hung below hummingbird feeders.
—
Peg Aloi,
The Spruce,
4 June 2026
In Latin America stadiums have been constructed with anti-hooligan architecture such as high fencing and moats.
—
Gitanjali Roy,
Encyclopedia Britannica,
1 June 2026
This control was reflected in the layout of the site, in which workshop areas–identified by furnaces and bronze artifacts—were enclosed by earthen walls and moats, suggesting oversight and protection.
—
Anne Doran,
ARTnews.com,
8 Apr. 2026
Recent Examples of Synonyms for moats
Noun
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Police and fire rescue experts say this is also serves a reminder to always wear personal flotation devices in and around rivers, creeks, ditches and lakes.
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They're mostly found in the swamps, sloughs, wetlands, and drainage ditches of the western coastal plain, and are occasionally found around rivers and lakes.
Noun
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The research team plans to return to the Diamantina Fracture Zone to survey the rest of the trench in the hopes of finding more whale fossils and new forms of life, and the discovery raises the possibility of learning more about whale evolution by exploring the ocean’s other deep-sea trenches.
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Similar hard-substrate communities were also observed on rocks in the Aleutian, Kuril‑Kamchatka, Atacama, Puysegur, Atacama, and Mussau trenches.
Noun
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Constructing protective structures such as levees and dikes can help, as can preserving natural landscapes, such as wetlands and estuaries that can act as a natural sponge to absorb floodwaters, in and near the cities, Shao and her colleagues wrote.
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The dikes would consist of walls surrounding the city, separating it from the lagoon, Lionello said.
Noun
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Scott Gordon, chief of water enforcement for EPA’s regional office at the time, toured the site in 2000 and said he was shocked by how the industrial water found its path into the river, sometimes through gullies cut by the flow.
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Authorities say the mountain sees about a dozen rescues and one fatality per year, with slip-and-falls in steep gullies being a common danger.
Noun
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The gardens were developed in the 1930s on a site featuring natural ravines, now crossed by suspension bridges and laced with trails.
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The face of the moon never looks the same from one night to the next, as the shifting angle between the moon and sun causes sunlight to sweep across its surface, altering the shadows cast by craters, mountain ranges and ravines.
Cite this Entry
“Moats.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/moats. Accessed 29 Jun. 2026.
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