Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • intransitive verb To run or go quickly and lightly.
  • noun A quick light run or movement.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To run with speed; hasten away.
  • noun A hasty run or flight.
  • noun One who scamps work.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun A scampering; a hasty flight.
  • intransitive verb To run with speed; to run or move in a quick, hurried manner; to hasten away.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A quick, light run.
  • verb intransitive To run quickly and lightly, especially in a playful manner or in an undignified manner.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun rushing about hastily in an undignified way
  • verb to move about or proceed hurriedly

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Probably from Flemish schampeeren, frequentative of obsolete Dutch schampen, to run away, decamp, from Middle Dutch ontscampen, from Old French escamper, from Old Italian scampare, from Vulgar Latin *excampāre, from Latin ex campō, out of the field : ex, away; see ex– + campō, ablative of campus, field.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

First attested in 1687. Origin uncertain, but possibly from Dutch schamperen, from Old French escamper, from Italian scampare ("to run away").

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Examples

  • I've enjoyed watching this game of blog tag scamper about some of my favorite blog writers.

    Archive 2008-10-01 ScentScelf 2008

  • I've enjoyed watching this game of blog tag scamper about some of my favorite blog writers.

    I'm it. ScentScelf 2008

  • Thanks!!! bill dance fishing flygate chironomid cheap vanagon transporteur treasure hunter karman ghia teenie two carravelle autosleeper hausman crooked tongues running shoes lance agreement xp2400 king size alpha tag scamper financial centre - 2006-08-20 13: 56: 35

    Sunday, Update on pics barbylon 2004

  • He swiveled aside to let a stream of half-naked boys and girls playing some spontaneously generated variant of tag scamper past.

    Beowulf's Children Niven, Larry 1995

  • Bran, [423] poor fellow, lies yawning at my feet, and cannot think what is become of the daily scamper, which is all his master's inability affords him.

    The Journal of Sir Walter Scott From the Original Manuscript at Abbotsford Walter Scott 1801

  • MALVEAUX: And then the mice that used to, like, kind of scamper a bit.

    CNN Transcript Jul 11, 2007 2007

  • MALVEAUX: That used to, like, kind of scamper a bit.

    CNN Transcript Jul 15, 2007 2007

  • Which means he has to do a little bit better than "scamper" around the perimeter.

    CelticsBlog 2009

  • There's no reason why a Roman barracks should have been any different from an 18th-century European one, with entire families crammed into the neat rooms, with bunks curtained off, and the young couple in the corner on the top bunk making babies while the woman in the bottom bunk is giving birth to her fourth, and the children scamper under foot, or making themselves useful polishing kit.

    They're still our lads... zornhau 2009

  • I say the Serenity Prayer every day with my kids before they scamper in to the schoolhouse. datingjesus

    Reinhold Niebuhr wrote it after all « Dating Jesus 2009

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