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scrub - What does it mean?

Definition of 'scrub'

English

Etymology 1

(en)

Adjective

(en-adj)
  • Mean; dirty; contemptible; scrubby.
  • * (rfdate)'' (Walpole)
  • How solitary, how scrub, does this town look!
  • * (rfdate), (Jonathan Swift)
  • No little scrub joint shall come on my board.

    Noun

    (en-noun)
  • One who labors hard and lives meanly; a mean fellow.
  • * John Bunyan, A Pilgrim's Promise
  • a sorry scrub
  • * Oliver Goldsmith, The Vicar of Wakefield
  • We should go there in as proper a manner possible; nor altogether like the scrubs about us.
  • A worn-out brush.
  • (Ainsworth)
  • One who is incompetent or unable to complete easy tasks.
  • A thicket or jungle, often specified by the name of the prevailing plant; as, oak scrub', palmetto ' scrub , etc.
  • * |chapter=1
  • |title= Mr. Pratt's Patients|chapter=1 |passage=I stumbled along through the young pines and huckleberry bushes. Pretty soon I struck into a sort of path that, I cal'lated, might lead to the road I was hunting for. It twisted and turned, and, the first thing I knew, made a sudden bend around a bunch of bayberry scrub and opened out into a big clear space like a lawn.}}
  • (US|stock breeding) One of the common livestock of a region of no particular breed or not of pure breed, especially when inferior in size, etc. Often used to refer to male animals unsuited for breeding.
  • Vegetation of inferior quality, though sometimes thick and impenetrable, growing in poor soil or in sand; also, brush.
  • One not on the first team of players, a substitute.
  • Derived terms
    * scrubbable * scrub game * scrub race
    Derived terms
    * scrub bird * scrub oak * scrub robin

    Etymology 2

    From (etyl)

    Verb

    (scrubb)
  • To rub hard; to wash with rubbing; usually, to rub with a wet brush, or with something coarse or rough, for the purpose of cleaning or brightening; as, to scrub a floor, a doorplate.
  • To rub anything hard, especially with a wet brush; to scour;
  • (figuratively) To be diligent and penurious; as, to scrub hard for a living.
  • To call off a scheduled event; to cancel.
  • Engineers had to scrub the satellite launch due to bad weather.
  • (databases) To eliminate or to correct data from a set of records to bring it inline with other similar datasets
  • The street segment data from the National Post Office will need to be scrubbed before it can be integrated into our system.
  • (audio) To move a recording tape back and forth with a scrubbing-like motion to produce a scratching sound, or to do so by a similar use of a control on an editing system.
  • (audio|video) To maneuver the play position on a media editing system by using a scroll bar.
  • Noun

    (en-noun)
  • An instance of scrubbing.
  • A cancellation.
  • A worn-out brush.
  • One who scrubs.
  • (medicine|in the plural) Clothing worn while performing surgery.
  • An exfoliant for the body.
  • Anagrams

    *

    Similar to 'scrub'

    scarab, sorb, shrub, sharab, srub, scrab