tramp

Meanings

Noun

• A homeless person; a vagabond.
• A disreputable, promiscuous woman; a slut.
• Any ship which does not have a fixed schedule or published ports of call.
• A long walk, possibly of more than one day, in a scenic or wilderness area.
• Short form of trampoline, especially a very small one.
• Of objects, stray and intrusive and unwanted
• A metal plate worn by diggers under the hollow of the foot to save the shoe.

Verb

• To walk with heavy footsteps.
• To walk for a long time (usually through difficult terrain).
• To hitchhike.
• To tread upon forcibly and repeatedly; to trample.
• To travel or wander through.
• To cleanse, as clothes, by treading upon them in water.

Origin

• From Middle English trampen ("to walk heavily"), from Middle Low German trampen ("to stamp") (trampeln, see trample), or Middle Dutch trampen ("to stamp"), from Proto-West Germanic *trampan, from an extension of Proto-Indo-European *dr-, *drem-, *dreh₂-. tremp.
• The noun sense “vagabond” evolved from the sense “one who tramps”, from 1664. The sense "ship" is from about 1880, sense "promiscuous woman" is from 1922.
• Cognate to Dutch trampen ("to stamp, kick, step"), dialectal German trampen ("to step, walk, tread"), whence commoner German trampeln ("to trample"). Probably related to trap.