"bone-grubber" meaning in English

See bone-grubber in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Noun

Forms: bone-grubbers [plural]
Head templates: {{en-noun}} bone-grubber (plural bone-grubbers)
  1. (obsolete) A person who scavenges for waste materials such as bones and rags to sell. Tags: obsolete Synonyms: bone-picker, rag-and-bone man
    Sense id: en-bone-grubber-en-noun-euw71d5Y Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, Pages with 1 entry

Inflected forms

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "bone-grubbers",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "bone-grubber (plural bone-grubbers)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with 1 entry",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1842, William Collier, “A Chapter on Beards”, in Bentley’s Miscellany, Volume 11, January-June 1842, p. 575:",
          "text": "More than half of our modern scribes, and particularly the dramatic portion of them, are little better than literary bone-'''grubbers, pickers and stealers of unconsidered trifles,—men who, having no brains, live by spinning the brains of others, and give themselves credt for originality.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1851, Henry Mayhew, London Labour and the London Poor, volume 2, page 139:",
          "text": "The bone-grubber generally seeks out the narrow back streets, where dust and refuse are cast, or where any dust-bins are accessible. The articles for which he chiefly searches are rags and bones—rags he prefers—but waste metal, such as bits of lead, pewter, copper, brass, or old iron, he prizes above all.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1875 February, James Mackintosh, “All About Rats”, in Ballou’s Monthly Magazine, volume 41, number 2, page 183:",
          "text": "If anyone believes that rats are not used for human food, he must change his opinion. In Paris the chiffoniers or bone-grubbers eat them.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1880, W. T. Washburn, chapter 47, in The Unknown City: A Story of New York, New York: Jesse Haney & Co, page 351:",
          "text": "While you were there father died. As you know, he was a bone-grubber; the only property he left me was a hooked stick, a bag, and a horse’s skeleton.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "A person who scavenges for waste materials such as bones and rags to sell."
      ],
      "id": "en-bone-grubber-en-noun-euw71d5Y",
      "links": [
        [
          "scavenge",
          "scavenge"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(obsolete) A person who scavenges for waste materials such as bones and rags to sell."
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "bone-picker"
        },
        {
          "word": "rag-and-bone man"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "obsolete"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "bone-grubber"
}
{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "bone-grubbers",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "bone-grubber (plural bone-grubbers)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English countable nouns",
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English nouns",
        "English terms with obsolete senses",
        "English terms with quotations",
        "Pages with 1 entry",
        "Quotation templates to be cleaned"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1842, William Collier, “A Chapter on Beards”, in Bentley’s Miscellany, Volume 11, January-June 1842, p. 575:",
          "text": "More than half of our modern scribes, and particularly the dramatic portion of them, are little better than literary bone-'''grubbers, pickers and stealers of unconsidered trifles,—men who, having no brains, live by spinning the brains of others, and give themselves credt for originality.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1851, Henry Mayhew, London Labour and the London Poor, volume 2, page 139:",
          "text": "The bone-grubber generally seeks out the narrow back streets, where dust and refuse are cast, or where any dust-bins are accessible. The articles for which he chiefly searches are rags and bones—rags he prefers—but waste metal, such as bits of lead, pewter, copper, brass, or old iron, he prizes above all.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1875 February, James Mackintosh, “All About Rats”, in Ballou’s Monthly Magazine, volume 41, number 2, page 183:",
          "text": "If anyone believes that rats are not used for human food, he must change his opinion. In Paris the chiffoniers or bone-grubbers eat them.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1880, W. T. Washburn, chapter 47, in The Unknown City: A Story of New York, New York: Jesse Haney & Co, page 351:",
          "text": "While you were there father died. As you know, he was a bone-grubber; the only property he left me was a hooked stick, a bag, and a horse’s skeleton.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "A person who scavenges for waste materials such as bones and rags to sell."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "scavenge",
          "scavenge"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(obsolete) A person who scavenges for waste materials such as bones and rags to sell."
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "bone-picker"
        },
        {
          "word": "rag-and-bone man"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "obsolete"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "bone-grubber"
}

Download raw JSONL data for bone-grubber meaning in English (2.3kB)


This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-09-22 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-09-20 using wiktextract (af5c55c and 66545a6). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

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