scatter

present singular third person scatters · participle present scattering · participle past scattered · past scattered

1. ergativeTo (cause to) separate and go in different directions; to disperse.

   The crowd scattered in terror.

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   Scatter and disperse the giddy Goths.

   c. 1588–1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Lamentable Tragedy of Titus Andronicus”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii]

2. transitiveTo distribute loosely as by sprinkling.

   Her ashes were scattered at the top of a waterfall.

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   Why should my muse enlarge on Libyan swains, / Their scattered cottages, and ample plains?

   1697, Virgil, “The Third Book of the Georgics”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC

3. transitivenatural sciencesTo deflect (radiation or particles).

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   Chasca's ring is unique. It appears to be, for lack of a better term, a massive piece of alien "installation art." The rings are made of small pieces of synthetic material, and are almost invisible from space. From the ground, they catch and scatter the light of Matano in picturesque ways. It is not known who created the ring or when.

   2008, BioWare, Mass Effect (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →ISBN, →OCLC, PC, scene: Chasca planetary description

4. intransitiveTo occur or fall at widely spaced intervals.
5. transitiveTo frustrate, disappoint, and overthrow.

   to scatter hopes or plans

6. transitiveTo be dispersed upon.

   Desiccated stalks scattered the fields.

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   […] its beauty is obscured by the environmental waste and loose trash that scatter the countryside.

   2016, J. D. Vance, Hillbilly Elegy, page 21

7. transitiveball gamesOf a pitcher: to spread out a high number of hits or walks between innings so as not to give up a high number of runs
8. USslangTo leave.

   When the police showed up, I scattered.

plural scatters

1. countableuncountableThe act of scattering or dispersing.
2. countableuncountableA collection of dispersed objects.

   The plot of all our sea-level index points shows a scatter of data points that do not overlap […]

   2015, Ian Shennan, Antony J. Long, Benjamin P. Horton, Handbook of Sea-Level Research, John Wiley & Sons, →ISBN, page 19

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   The Los Angeles Basin evolved as a mobility surface principally through the combination of an initial system of electric railways connecting a scatter of agricultural settlement settlements.

   2006, Theano S. Terkenli, Anne-Marie d'Hauteserre, Landscapes of a New Cultural Economy of Space, Springer Science & Business Media, →ISBN, page 84

   A broad scatter of kurgan graves in the steppes contained imported Tripolye C2 pots (among other imported pot types) and a few, like Serezlievka, also contained Tripolye-like schematic rod-headed figurines.

   2007, David W. Anthony, The Horse, the Wheel, and Language, Princeton: Princeton University Press, page 498