Definition of "rummage"

rummage

/ˈɹʌm.ɪd͡ʒ/

verb
third-person singular simple present rummages, present participle rummaging, simple past and past participle rummaged
1. (transitive, nautical) To arrange (cargo, goods, etc.) in the hold of a ship; to move or rearrange such goods.
2. (transitive, nautical) To search a vessel for smuggled goods.
3. (transitive) To search something thoroughly and with disregard for the way in which things were arranged.
  Quotations
  He […] searcheth his pockets, and taketh his keys, and so rummageth all his closets and trunks.
  1655, James Howell, “To the Rt. Hon. the Lord Mohun”, in Epistolæ Ho-Elianæ. Familiar Letters Domestic and Forren. […], 3rd edition, volume (please specify the page), London: […] Humphrey Mos[e]ley, […]
  What schoolboy of us has not rummaged his Greek dictionary in vain for a satisfactory account!
  1866, Matthew Arnold, The Study of Celtic Literature
  British journalists shun complete respectability, feeling a duty to be ready to savage the mighty, or rummage through their bins. Elsewhere in Europe, government contracts and subsidies ensure that press barons will only defy the mighty so far.
  2013 August 10, Lexington, “Keeping the mighty honest”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8848
  1. (intransitive) To hastily search for something in a confined space and among many items by carelessly turning things over or pushing things aside.
    Quotations
    Philander went into the next room […] and came back with a salt mackerel that dripped brine like a rainstorm. Then he put the coffee pot on the stove and rummaged out a loaf of dry bread and some hardtack.
    1913, Joseph C. Lincoln, chapter 8, in Mr. Pratt's Patients
noun
countable and uncountable, plural rummages
1. A thorough search, usually resulting in disorder.
  Quotations
  He has made such a general rummage and reform in the office of matrimony.
  1753 May 24, Horace Walpole, letter to the Hon. H. S. Conway
2. (obsolete) Commotion; disturbance.
3. A disorganized collection of miscellaneous objects; a jumble.
4. (nautical) A place or room for the stowage of cargo in a ship.
5. (nautical) The act of stowing cargo; the pulling and moving about of packages incident to close stowage.

Definition of "rummage"

rummage

verb

Quotations

Quotations

noun

Quotations