traverse

plural traverses

1. climbingA route used in mountaineering, specifically rock climbing, in which the descent occurs by a different route than the ascent.
2. geographyA series of points, with angles and distances measured between, traveled around a subject, usually for use as "control" i.e. angular reference system for later surveying work.

   At the entrance of the king, the first traverse was drawn, and the lower descent of the mountain discovered, which was the pendant of a hill to life, with divers boscages and grovets upon the steep or hanging grounds thereof.

   1811, Ben Jonson, The Dramatic Works: Embellished with Portraits, volume 4, page 571

3. obsoleteA screen or partition.

   At the entrance of the king, / The first traverse was drawn.

   1613, Francis Beaumont, The Masque of the Inner Temple and Gray's Inn

   1 more example

   Than sholde ye see there pressynge in a pace / Of one and other that wolde this lady see, / Whiche sat behynde a traves of sylke fyne, / Of golde of tessew the fynest that myghte be […]

   1499, John Skelton, The Bowge of Court

4. Something that thwarts or obstructs.

   He will succeed, as long as there are no unlucky traverses not under his control.

5. architectureA gallery or loft of communication from side to side of a church or other large building.
6. lawA formal denial of some matter of fact alleged by the opposite party in any stage of the pleadings. The technical words introducing a traverse are absque hoc ("without this", i.e. without what follows).
7. nauticalThe zigzag course or courses made by a ship in passing from one place to another; a compound course.

   Two years earlier another U.S. submarine, U.S.S. Nautilus, had made history by completing the first undersea traverse of the North Pole.

   1990 August, John Bockstoce, “Changing Images of the Northwest Passage”, in National Geographic, volume 178, number 2, page 15

8. geometryA line lying across a figure or other lines; a transversal.
9. governmentIn trench warfare, a defensive trench built to prevent enfilade.

   At night, when the Federal guns slowed their fire, the men created new traverses and bombproofs.

   1994, Stephen R. Wise, Gate of Hell: Campaign for Charleston Harbor, 1863, page 160

10. nauticalA traverse board.

    The whole care of the vessel rested, therefore, upon me, and I was obliged to direct her by my former experience, not being able to work a traverse.

    1789, Olaudah Equiano, chapter 7, in The Interesting Narrative, volume I

present singular third person traverses · participle present traversing · participle past traversed · past traversed

1. transitiveTo travel across, to go through, to pass through, particularly under difficult conditions.

   He will have to traverse the mountain to get to the other side.

   3 more examples

   What seas you travers'd, and what fields you fought! / Your country's peace how oft, how dearly bought!

   1737, Alexander Pope, First Epistle on the Second Book of Horace, lines 396–397; republished in The Complete Poetical Works of Alexander Pope, Boston, New York: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1902, page 197

   Here the line is joined by the Colne Valley branch, and both tracks are carried into Haverhill station upon a high embankment from which the town can be seen on the south side. The twin tracks, after traversing a scissors crossover, become the down and up roads through the station, which possesses an extensive goods yard.

   1951 September, B. D. J. Walsh, “The Sudbury and Haverhill Line, Eastern Region”, in Railway Magazine, page 619

   The journey is worth an article in itself, but all I can give is a flavour of a railway which traverses a bleak but dramatic coastline that's regularly battered by the elements - especially around Parton, where the line is constantly threatened by the sea.

   2022 November 2, Paul Bigland, “New trains, old trains, and splendid scenery”, in RAIL, number 969, pages 56–57

2. transitivecomputingTo visit all parts of; to explore thoroughly.

   to traverse all nodes in a network

3. To lay in a cross direction; to cross.

   The parts should be often traversed, or crossed, by the flowing of the folds.

   1695, C[harles] A[lphonse] du Fresnoy, translated by John Dryden, De Arte Graphica. The Art of Painting, […], London: […] J[ohn] Heptinstall for W. Rogers, […], →OCLC

4. engineeringTo rotate a gun around a vertical axis to bear upon a military target.

   to traverse a cannon

5. climbingTo climb or descend a steep hill at a wide angle (relative to the slope).
6. engineeringTo (make a cutting, an incline) across the gradients of a sloped face at safe rate.

   The last run, weary, I traversed the descents in no hurry to reach the lodge.

   1 more example

   the road traversed the face of the ridge as the right-of-way climbed the mountain

7. To act against; to thwart or obstruct.

   I cannot but […] admit the force of this reasoning, which I yet hope to traverse.

   1819 December 20 (indicated as 1820), Walter Scott, Ivanhoe; a Romance. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co. […], →OCLC

   1 more example

   The well meaning Prieſt ſuffered him to deceive himſelf, fully determined to traverſe his views, inſtead of ſeconding them.

   1764 December 24 (indicated as 1765), Onuphrio Muralto, translated by William Marshal [pseudonyms; Horace Walpole], chapter II, in The Castle of Otranto, […], London: […] Tho[mas] Lownds […], →OCLC, page 74

8. To pass over and view; to survey carefully.

   My purpose is to […] traverse the nature, principles, and properties of this detestable vice—ingratitude.

   1675, Robert South, Of the odious Sin of Ingratitude (A Sermon preached at Christ-Church, Oxon, October 17, 1675)

9. businessTo plane in a direction across the grain of the wood.

   to traverse a board

10. lawTo deny formally.

    Without their coſt, you terminate the cauſe; / And ſave th' expence of long litigious laws: / Where ſuits are travers'd; and ſo little won, / That he who conquers, is but laſt undone: […]

    a. 1701 (date written), John Dryden, “Epistle the Thirteenth. To My Honoured Kinsman, John Dryden, of Chesterton, in the County of Huntingdon, Esq”, in The Miscellaneous Works of John Dryden, […], volume II, London: […] J[acob] and R[ichard] Tonson, […], published 1760, →OCLC, page 186

11. intransitivefencingTo use the motions of opposition or counteraction.

comparative more traverse · superlative most traverse

1. athwart; across; crosswise

comparative more traverse · superlative most traverse

1. Lying across; being in a direction across something else.

   paths cut with traverse trenches

   2 more examples

   Oak […] being strong in all positions, may be better trusted in cross and traverse work.

   1624, Henry Wotton, The Elements of Architecture, […], London: […] Iohn Bill, →OCLC

   the ridges of the fallow field lay trauerse

   a. 1628 (date written), John Hayward, The Life, and Raigne of King Edward the Sixt, London: […] [Eliot’s Court Press, and J. Lichfield at Oxford?] for Iohn Partridge, […], published 1630, →OCLC

plural Traverses

1. A surname from French.