Definitions

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

  • noun A step with the foot.
  • noun The sound of a foot stepping.
  • noun The distance covered by a step.
  • noun A step on which to go up or down.
  • idiom (follow in (someone's) footsteps) To carry on the behavior, work, or tradition of.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A tread of the foot; a footfall; a stepping: as, I hear his footstep on the stair.
  • noun The mark or impression of a foot; a footprint; a track.
  • noun Hence plural The steps taken or methods pursued in any series of actions; a course of proceedings or measures, or the track or path marked out by such a course: as, the conqueror's footsteps were everywhere marked by blood; to follow the footsteps or in the footsteps of one's predecessor.
  • noun An evidence or token of anything done; a manifest mark or indication.
  • noun In mech.: The pillow in which the foot of an upright or vertical shaft works.
  • noun An inclined plane under a hand printing-press.

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

  • noun The mark or impression of the foot; a track; hence, visible sign of a course pursued; token; mark.
  • noun An inclined plane under a hand printing press.

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

  • noun The mark or impression left by a foot; a track.
  • noun By extension, the indications or waypoints of a course or direction taken.
  • noun The sound made by walking, running etc.
  • noun A step, as in a stair.
  • noun The distance between one foot and the next when walking; a pace.
  • noun The act of taking a step.
  • noun obsolete An inclined plane under a hand printing press.

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

  • noun the distance covered by a step
  • noun the act of taking a step in walking
  • noun the sound of a step of someone walking

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

foot +‎ step

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Examples

  • He notes that, ‘A series of footsteps, for instance, can form a single experienced event, despite the fact that each footstep is a separate sound.’

    Audiosurf - Breakfast of Champions Ben Abraham 2008

  • He notes that, ‘A series of footsteps, for instance, can form a single experienced event, despite the fact that each footstep is a separate sound.’

    Archive 2008-12-01 Ben Abraham 2008

  • [ "Ah! faint are her limbs, and her footstep is weary,"] 5.

    Contents of _Complete Poetry of Percy Bysshe Shelley_ 1997

  • Jimmy's first emotion on hearing the footstep was the crude instinct of self-preservation.

    Piccadilly Jim 1928

  • Of course, William would come home as usual; and yet, though the sound of his footstep was the one sound she had listened for all day, Dora would immediately begin to petrify again, and when he would approach her with open arms, asking her to forgive and forget the morning, she would demur just long enough to set him alight again.

    Prose Fancies Richard Le Gallienne 1906

  • What it signifies I cannot conjecture, except it had some reference to a certain legend of a bloody footstep, which is currently told, and some token of which yet remains on one of the thresholds of the ancient mansion-house. "

    Doctor Grimshawe's Secret — a Romance Nathaniel Hawthorne 1834

  • Quoting from that report, Fear harries his every footstep, caution muffles his words.

    Sit-Down Strikes and Coxey's Army 2012

  • My steps crunch over the hard-packed snow that covers the drive, unmarred by a single footstep.

    Secret History of Elizabeth Tudor, Vampire Slayer Lucy Weston 2011

  • And another noise, like a footstep clop, footstep clop.

    Times Squared Julia DeVillers 2011

  • And we urge that the smart KDP members will follow their footstep and together we can over though the leadership and build a functional government that is for all citizens not just the three mafia families.

    Global Voices in English » Kurdistance: Launching the Arab Association for Kurdish Rights 2009

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