Library / English Dictionary

SCUFFLE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

An unceremonious and disorganized struggle

Synonyms:

scramble; scuffle

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Hypernyms ("scuffle" is a kind of...):

battle; struggle (an energetic attempt to achieve something)

Derivation:

scuffle (fight or struggle in a confused way at close quarters)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Disorderly fighting

Synonyms:

dogfight; hassle; rough-and-tumble; scuffle; tussle

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Hypernyms ("scuffle" is a kind of...):

combat; fight; fighting; scrap (the act of fighting; any contest or struggle)

Derivation:

scuffle (fight or struggle in a confused way at close quarters)

Sense 3

Meaning:

A hoe that is used by pushing rather than pulling

Synonyms:

Dutch hoe; scuffle; scuffle hoe

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Hypernyms ("scuffle" is a kind of...):

hoe (a tool with a flat blade attached at right angles to a long handle)

 II. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Fight or struggle in a confused way at close quarters

Example:

the drunken men started to scuffle

Synonyms:

scuffle; tussle

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Hypernyms (to "scuffle" is one way to...):

contend; fight; struggle (be engaged in a fight; carry on a fight)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Derivation:

scuffle (an unceremonious and disorganized struggle)

scuffle (disorderly fighting)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Walk by dragging one's feet

Example:

We heard his feet shuffling down the hall

Synonyms:

scuffle; shamble; shuffle

Classified under:

Verbs of walking, flying, swimming

Hypernyms (to "scuffle" is one way to...):

walk (use one's feet to advance; advance by steps)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "scuffle"):

drag; scuff (walk without lifting the feet)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s PP

Sentence example:

The children scuffle to the playground

Credits

 Context examples: 

I knew Mr. Rochester; though the begrimed face, the disordered dress (his coat hanging loose from one arm, as if it had been almost torn from his back in a scuffle), the desperate and scowling countenance, the rough, bristling hair might well have disguised him.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Unfortunately for her, she had lost her glasses in the scuffle, and as she was extremely short-sighted she was really helpless without them.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

A considerable scuffling within ensued, but nothing else.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

I have also seen some bickering and scuffling.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

There was a sudden scuffle, a sound of blows, and out burst Abraham Gray with a knife cut on the side of the cheek, and came running to the captain like a dog to the whistle.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

He has little time, for he has heard the scuffle downstairs when the wife tried to force her way up, and perhaps he has already heard from his Lascar confederate that the police are hurrying up the street.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

There he was dogged by his confederate, who held Beppo responsible for the loss of the pearl, and he stabbed him in the scuffle which followed.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Its panelled rooms, discoloured with the dirt and smoke of a hundred years, I dare say; its decaying floors and staircase; the squeaking and scuffling of the old grey rats down in the cellars; and the dirt and rottenness of the place; are things, not of many years ago, in my mind, but of the present instant.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

In the very midst of the scuffle, however, whilst Alleyne braced himself to feel the cold blade between his shoulders, there came a sudden scurry of hoofs, and the black man yelled with terror and ran for his life through the heather.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

At his fall the guardsmen took to their heels in one direction and the loungers in the other, while a number of better dressed people, who had watched the scuffle without taking part in it, crowded in to help the lady and to attend to the injured man.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)