maunder

maunder

English

WOTD – 24 October 2006

Etymology

From earlier maund (“to beg”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈmɔːndə/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈmɔndɚ/

• Audio (US)

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Verb

maunder (third-person singular simple present maunders, present participle maundering, simple past and past participle maundered)

1. To speak in a disorganized or desultory manner; to babble or prattle.
   • 1826, [Walter Scott], Woodstock; Or, The Cavalier. […], volume (please specify |volume=I, II, or III), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown, and Green, OCLC 991895633:

     He was ever maundering by the how that he met a party of scarlet devils.

   • 1834, Maria Edgeworth, Helen, v. 3, ch. V

     "Not so fast, Lady Cecilia; not yet;" and now Louisa went on with a medical maundering. "As to low spirits, my dear Cecilia, I must say I agree with Sir Sib Pennyfeather, who tells me it is not mere common low spirits […] "

   • 1871, Henry James, A Passionate Pilgrim, ch. IV

     On the following day my friend's exhaustion had become so great that I began to fear his intelligence altogether broken up. But toward evening he briefly rallied, to maunder about many things, confounding in a sinister jumble the memories of the past weeks and those of bygone years.

   • 1889, Mark Twain, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, ch. XVII

     What are you maundering about? He's going out from here a free man and whole—he's not going to die.

   • 2014 November 14, Blake Bailey, “'Tennessee Williams,' by John Lahr [print version: Theatrical victory of art over life, International New York Times, 18 November 2014, p. 13]”, in The New York Times‎:

     Whether Edwina [mother of Tennessee Williams] had sufficient self-awareness to recognize her own maundering about (say) "seventeen! – gentleman callers!" is doubtful, but she was indeed Amanda [Wingfield, character in Williams' play The Glass Menagerie] in the flesh: a doughty chatterbox from Ohio who adopted the manner of a Southern belle and eschewed both drink and sex to the greatest extent possible.

2. To wander or walk aimlessly.
   • 1959, Walt Kelly, Pogo, April 24 comic strip (→ISBN, p. 35):

     [Deacon Mushrat to Pogo:] The Machiavellian barratry of a pettifogging public has maundered into do-nothingism.

3. (intransitive, obsolete) To beg; to whine like a beggar.

Synonyms

• (speak in a disorganized manner): babble, prattle, ramble
• (walk aimlessly): ramble, wander

Related terms

• maunderer
• maundering

Translations

speak in a disorganized manner

Bulgarian: говоря несвързано (govorja nesvǎrzano) Polish: bajtlować (pl) impf, zbajtlować pf Spanish: divagar (es)

walk aimlessly

Bulgarian: движа се безцелно (dviža se bezcelno) Spanish: holgazanear (es)

References

• 1827, Samuel Johnson, A Dictionary of the English Language:

  2. To wander about in a thoughtful manner; to talk confusedly; [perhaps from the Gael. mandagh, a stutterer.] A northern word. It is written both maunder and mander.

Noun

maunder (plural maunders)

1. (obsolete) A beggar.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for maunder in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913)

Anagrams

• Mundare, duramen, manured, unarmed, undream