Cargo Meaning
/ˈkɑːɡəʊ/Definition, CEFR level B2, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
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Definition
nounFreight carried by a ship, aircraft, or motor vehicle.
nounWestern material goods.
Sentence Examples
A cargo vessel, bound for Athens, sank in the Mediterranean without a trace.
The ship discharged its cargo in Panama.
The tanker began to spill its cargo of oil.
CEFR Practice Quiz
The ship transported a huge load of ____ including grain, machinery, and vehicles.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The large ship carried a heavy ____ of cars across the whole ocean.
Word Origin & History
Borrowed from Spanish cargo (“load, burden”), from cargar (“to load”), from Late Latin carricō. Doublet of charge and carga. Displaced native Old English fearm.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
""[…]her whole and entire cargo; and, also, all such other cargoes and property as may have been landed in the island of Teneriffe,[…]""
— 1806, James Harrison, The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson:
""[…]but human life is worth more than ships or cargos.""
— 1913, Nephi Anderson, Story of Chester Lawrence:
"How will heaven be filled if the earth ceases to send its cargoes?"
— 2005, J. M. Coetzee, “Five”, in Slow Man, New York: Viking, →ISBN, page 34:
"A battery of several microcannons can be used to fire the drug cargoes at different times and different depths.
“We have been working on nanomachines over the past decade,” Joseph Wang, chairman of nanoengineering at UCSD, said. “One of the challenges we considered is to deliver therapeutic cargo deep."
— 2016 February 1, Tom Whipple, “Microcannon firing nanobullets: the future of targeted medicine”, in The Times:
"The principal change was that two of the 'satans', Kilibob and Manup, were now identified by different groups as God and Jesus Christ, as cargo deities. This expressed the return to hostility towards Europeans and a reassessment of native rights to the cargo."
— 1964, Peter Lawrence, Road Belong Cargo:
Explore More B2 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
The ship transported a huge load of ____ including grain, machinery, and vehicles.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The large ship carried a heavy ____ of cars across the whole ocean.