scavenger

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   An animal that feeds on dead bodies or rotting matter.

   Vultures are natural scavengers that clean up carcasses.

2. 2
   noun

   A person who searches through discarded things for food or useful items.

   The scavenger sifted through the bins looking for scrap metal.

Simplified etymology

Scavenger developed from Middle English scavager, an official who collected scavage, a toll on foreign merchants’ goods. These officials later acquired responsibility for cleaning town streets. In the mid 16th century an n was inserted into scavager, as had happened in messenger and passenger, producing scavenger. The term later came to mean simply a street cleaner and then a person who collects usable things from discarded waste.

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 (“i…

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External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary