scavenger
/ˈskæv.ən.d͡ʒə(ɹ)/
scavenger noun: someone who scavenges, especially one who searches through rubbish for food or useful things.
Noun
scavenger (plural scavengers)
- Someone who scavenges, especially one who searches through rubbish for food or useful things.
- garbage scavenger
- A scavenger picked through the rubbish heap.
- An animal that feeds on decaying matter such as carrion.
- Vultures are natural scavengers.
- A street sweeper.
- A child employed to pick up loose cotton from the floor in a cotton mill.
- A substance used to remove impurities from the air or from a solution.
Verb
scavenger (third-person singular simple present scavengers, present participle scavengering, simple past and past participle scavengered)
scavenger meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Telugu
scavenger in Tamil
- தெரு பெருக்குநர், தோட்டி, கால்வலி, மாசு அகற்றி
scavenger in Urdu
- بھنگی, مہتر
scavenger in Bengali
- ঝাড়ুদার, পচা জিনিস ভক্ষণকারী প্রাণী
scavenger in Telugu
- స్కావెంజర్, స్కావెండర్
More languagesFewer languages
- scavenger in Malayalam
- തോട്ടിപ്പണിക്കാരൻ
- scavenger in Kannada
- ಜಾಡಮಾಲಿ, ಭಂಗಿ
- scavenger in Tagalog
- sasaid
- scavenger in Arabic
- نَبَّاش nabbāš, قَمَّام qammām
Examples of scavenger in a sentence
- This is not to say that the larch are gluttons, greedsome water scavengers totally out of control.
- In addition to predators, the cavernicolous beetles are scavengers and opportunistic saprophiles.
- A new scavenger hunt is based on the superpopular High School Musical movies.
Forms of scavenger
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | scavengers |
| alternative form | skavenger |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | scavengers |
| present participle | scavengering |
| past participle | scavengered |
| past | scavengered |
Origin of scavenger
Originally from Middle English scavager, from Anglo-Norman scawageour (“one who had to do with scavage, inspector, tax collector”), from Old Northern French *scawage, escauwage (“scavage”), Old French *scavage, escavage, alteration of escauvinghe (compare Medieval Latin scewinga, sceawinga), from Old Dutch scauwōn (“to inspect, to examinate, to look at”). Usually reinterpreted/re-analysed today as scavenge (which was originally a backformation from this word) + -er. Compare Old English sċēawung (“a showing, spectacle, examination, inspection, toll on exposure of goods”) and Dutch schouwing (“inspection”). More at show. See also messenger and passenger.
Words formed from scavenger
Phrases with scavenger
Questions about scavenger
- What does scavenger mean?
- Scavenger means someone who scavenges, especially one who searches through rubbish for food or useful things.
- What is scavenger in Tamil?
- Scavenger in Tamil is தெரு பெருக்குநர், தோட்டி, கால்வலி. See Scavenger meaning in Tamil.
- What part of speech is scavenger?
- Scavenger can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce scavenger?
- Scavenger is pronounced /ˈskæv.ən.d͡ʒə(ɹ)/ (UK).
- What is the plural of scavenger?
- The plural of scavenger is scavengers.
Words near scavenger in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: scavenger (page history and authors); scavenger (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); scavenger (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); scavenger (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); scavenger (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); scavenger (Malayalam, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); scavenger (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-uk-scavenger.ogg.
Cite this entry: “scavenger.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/scavenger. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.