scope

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   The range of things that a subject, plan, or activity deals with.

   Environmental impacts lie outside the scope of this report.

2. 2
   noun

   The opportunity or freedom to do or develop something.

   My job doesn't give me much scope for personal development.

3. 3
   verb

   To examine or look at something carefully to understand it.

   Let's scope out the area before we make our plan.

4. 4
   noun

   A device you look through to aim at a target, such as on a rifle or telescope.

   She lined up the deer in the scope of her rifle.

Simplified etymology

Scope comes from the Greek verb skopein, “to look at,” the same element used in the early-19th-century coinage kaleidoscope. It entered English in the mid-16th century.

From Italian scopo (“purpose”), from Latin scopus (“target”), from Ancient Greek σκοπός (skopós), from σκέπτομαι (sképtomai), from Proto-Indo-European *speḱ-. Etymologically related to skeptic and spectrum.

Topics

External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary