trot

plural trots

1. A gait of a person or animal faster than a walk but slower than a run.

   Waziri’s warriors marched at a rapid trot through the jungle in the direction of the village.

   1913, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Return of Tarzan, New York: Ballantine Books, published 1963, page 133

   Synonyms: jog

2. A brisk journey or progression.

   We often take the car and have a trot down to the beach.

   1 more example

   In this lesson we'll have a quick trot through Chapter 3 before moving on to Chapter 4.

3. A gait of a four-legged animal between walk and canter, a diagonal gait (in which diagonally opposite pairs of legs move together).

   The mare started at a walk before breaking into a trot.

   3 more examples

   Dogs have a variety of gaits. Most dogs have the walk, trot, pace, and gallop.

   2000, Margaret H. Bonham, Introduction to: Dog Agility, page 14

   The toelt is comfortable for the rider because the amplitude of the dorsoventral displacement is lower than at the trot.[…]The slow trot is a two-beat symmetric diagonal gait. Among the normal variations of the trot of saddle horses, the speed of the gait increases from collected to extended trot.

   2008, Kenneth W. Hinchcliff, Andris J. Kaneps, Raymond J. Geor, Equine Exercise Physiology: The Science of Exercise in the Athletic Horse, Elsevier, page 154

   To assume the correct position for the posting trot, first walk, with the body inclined forward in a posting position. Then put the horse into a slow or sitting trot at six miles an hour. Do not post.

   2009, Gordon Wright, George H. Morris, Learning To Ride, Hunt, And Show, page 65

4. A toddler.First known use 1854.

   1855, William Makepeace Thackeray, The Newcomes, 1869, The Works of William Makepeace Thackeray, Volume V: The Newcomes, Volume I, page 123, […] but Ethel romped with the little children — the rosy little trots — and took them on her knees, and told them a thousand stories.

5. danceA moderately rapid dance.
6. obsoleteA young animal.First known use 1895.
7. archaicderogatoryAn ugly old woman, a hag.First known use 1362.

   Synonyms: old woman

8. AustraliaobsoleteA succession of heads thrown in a game of two-up.
9. AustraliaNew ZealandA run of luck or fortune.

   He′s had a good trot, but his luck will end soon.

   2 more examples

   It was to be a hugely special occasion, for apart from the picture shows at the Majestic, there was usually nothing at all going on in Sandspit to make anyone think they were on a good trot living there.

   1994, Noel Virtue, Sandspit Crossing, page 34

   Should he or she be having a bad trot, the exchange rate will be higher than normal.

   2004, John Mosig, Ric Fallu, Australian Fish Farmer: A Practical Guide to Aquaculture, 2nd edition, page 21

10. datedslangamong studentsSynonym of horse (illegitimate study aid)

    Synonyms: horse

11. informalDiarrhoea.

    He's got a bad case of the trots and has to keep running off to the toilet.

present singular third person trots · participle present trotting · participle past trotted · past trotted

1. intransitiveTo move along briskly; specifically, to move at a pace between a walk and a run.

   The dog trotted along obediently by his master's side.

   5 more examples

   I didn't want to miss my bus, so I trotted the last few hundred yards to the stop.

   Then up Jack got. And home did trot, As fast as he could caper; Dame Gill did the job, To plaster his nob With vinegar and brown paper.

   1810, Jack and Jill, and old Dame Gill, York: J. Kendrew, page 3

   I would trot ten or twelve miles each day, go into a cheap restaurant and eat my fill of bread, but would never be satisfied. During these wanderings I once hit on a vegetarian restaurant in Farringdon Street. The sight of it filled me with the same joy that a child feels on getting a thing after its own heart.

   1927-29, M.K. Gandhi, The Story of My Experiments with Truth, translated 1940 by Mahadev Desai, Part I, Chapter xiv

   They sent little Jane to the garden to play, But she opened the gate, and then trotted away Under the hawthorns and down the green lane, Bad little, mad little, runaway Jane!

   c. 1920s-1930s, Charlotte Druitt Cole, Runaway Jane

   It was earliest morning, when even small trees cast long shadows and scarlet foxes trot denward through the dew like flecks of fire.

   1987, Gene Wolfe, chapter XXVIII, in The Urth of the New Sun, 1st US edition, New York: Tor Books, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 164

2. intransitiveTo move at a gait between a walk and a canter.
3. transitiveTo cause to move, as a horse or other animal, in the pace called a trot; to cause to run without galloping or cantering.
4. UKarchaicslangtransitiveTo bid against (a person) at an auction, so as to raise the price of the goods.

   A particular friend of mine complained that I had "trotted" him at a sale, but he did not see what was happening on the part of the other bidder.

   1927, Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons, The Parliamentary Debates (Official Report), page 2221

1. uncountableA genre of Korean pop music employing repetitive rhythm and vocal inflections.

   Synonyms: ppongjjak

plural trots

1. alternativeAlternative form of Trot (“Trotskyist”).

   The problem is that the likes of Shapps and his boss Boris Johnson are eager for a fight with the unions. They are being deliberately provocative, so they can portray railway workers as 'troublesome trots'.

   2022 June 15, Christian Wolmar, “What do the railways need and how can we fulfil that need?”, in RAIL, number 959, page 45

plural Trots · alternative trot

1. derogatoryslangA Trotskyite.

   We believed that the Trots represented a mad, extreme form of Labour that was never going to do anything for anybody, yet we felt strongly that nothing would be achieved by jumping ship and defecting to the SDP.

   2008, Cherie Blair, Speaking for Myself: My Life from Liverpool to Downing Street

   1 more example

   Loyal to a tee, he is still at a loss to understand the failure of the Frank Dobson candidacy in the London mayoral contest, and abandoned constituency meetings after a couple of events because they were "too dominated by Trots".

   2001 October 3, Matthew Tempest, “New Labour's power-dressed future”, in The Guardian

   Synonyms: Trotskyite