• IPA: /ˈtɹɪbjʊtəɹi/

tributary (plural tributaries)

1. A natural water stream that flows into a larger river or other body of water.
2. A nation, state, or other entity that pays tribute.
   • 1602 : William Shakespeare, Hamlet, act V scene 2

     As England was his faithful tributary

• (stream which flows into a larger one) affluent

• French: affluent
• German: Nebenfluss, Zufluss
• Italian: affluente, tributario, immissario
• Portuguese: afluente
• Russian: прито́к
• Spanish: afluente

• Italian: vassallo
• Russian: да́нник

tributary (not comparable)

1. Related to the paying of tribute.
2. subordinate; inferior
   • 1634 October 9 (first performance)​, [John Milton], H[enry] Lawes, editor, A Maske Presented at Ludlow Castle, 1634: […] [Comus], London: Printed [by Augustine Matthews] for Hvmphrey Robinson, […], published 1637, OCLC 228715864 ↗; reprinted as Comus: […] (Dodd, Mead & Company’s Facsimile Reprints of Rare Books; Literature Series; no. I), New York, N.Y.: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1903, OCLC 1113942837 ↗:

     to grace his tributary gods

3. Yielding supplies of any kind; serving to form or make up, a greater object of the same kind, as a part, branch, etc.; contributing.

   The Ohio has many tributary streams, and is itself tributary to the Mississippi.

• tribute

• Italian: tributario