Scavenger
noun, verb ·3 syllables ·Moderate ·College level
Definitions
- 1 Someone who scavenges, especially one who searches through rubbish for food or useful things.
"garbage scavenger"
- 2 any animal that feeds on refuse and other decaying organic matter wordnet
- 3 An animal that feeds on decaying matter such as carrion.
"Vultures are natural scavengers."
- 4 someone who collects things that have been discarded by others wordnet
- 5 A street sweeper. Ireland, UK, obsolete
Show 3 more definitions
- 6 a chemical agent that is added to a chemical mixture to counteract the effects of impurities wordnet
- 7 A child employed to pick up loose cotton from the floor in a cotton mill. Ireland, UK, historical
- 8 A substance used to remove impurities from the air or from a solution.
- 1 To scavenge. archaic
- 2 To clean the rubbish from a street, etc. archaic
Example
More examples"I'm organizing a scavenger hunt for my son's thirteenth birthday party."
Etymology
Originally from Middle English scavager, from Anglo-Norman scawageour (“one who had to do with scavage, inspector, tax collector”), from Old Northern French *scawage, escauwage (“scavage”), Old French *scavage, escavage, alteration of escauvinghe (compare Medieval Latin scewinga, sceawinga), from Old Dutch scauwōn (“to inspect, to examinate, to look at”). Usually reinterpreted/re-analysed today as scavenge (which was originally a backformation from this word) + -er. Compare Old English sċēawung (“a showing, spectacle, examination, inspection, toll on exposure of goods”) and Dutch schouwing (“inspection”). More at show.