Scavenger definition | Dictionary.com

scav⋅en⋅ger

[skav-in-jer]

–noun

1.	an animal or other organism that feeds on dead organic matter.

2.	a person who searches through and collects items from discarded material.

3.	a street cleaner.

4.	Chemistry. a chemical that consumes or renders inactive the impurities in a mixture.

Origin:
1520–30; earlier scavager < AF scawageour, equiv. to (e)scawage inspection (escaw(er) to inspect < MD schauwen to look at (c. show ) + -age -age ) + -eour -or ²

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.
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American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

scav·en·ger (skāv'ən-jər) Pronunciation Key
n.

One that scavenges, as a person who searches through refuse for food.
An animal, such as a bird or insect, that feeds on dead or decaying matter.
Chemistry A substance added to a mixture to remove or inactivate impurities.

[Alteration of Middle English scauager, schavager, official charged with street maintenance, from Anglo-Norman scawager, toll collector, from scawage, a tax on the goods of foreign merchants, from Flemish scauwen, to look at, show.]

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Online Etymology Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
scavenger

originally "person hired to remove refuse from streets," from M.E. scawageour (1373), London official in charge of collecting tax on goods sold by foreign merchants, from Anglo-Fr. scawager, from scawage "toll or duty on goods offered for sale in one's precinct" (1402), from O.N.Fr. escauwage "inspection," from a Gmc. source (cf. O.H.G. scouwon, O.E. sceawian "to look at, inspect," see show). With intrusive -n- (1503) as in harbinger, passenger, messenger. Extended to animals 1596. The verb scavenge is a 1644 back-formation. Scavenger hunt is attested from 1940.

Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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WordNet - Cite This Source - Share This

scavenger
noun
1.	a chemical agent that is added to a chemical mixture to counteract the effects of impurities
2.	someone who collects things that have been discarded by others [syn: magpie]
3.	any animal that feeds on refuse and other decaying organic matter

WordNet® 3.0, © 2006 by Princeton University.
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The American Heritage Science Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

scavenger (skāv'ən-jər) Pronunciation Key

An animal that feeds on dead organisms, especially a carnivorous animal that eats dead animals rather than or in addition to hunting live prey. Vultures, hyenas, and wolves are scavengers.

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Scavenger

Scav"en*ger\, n. [OE. scavager an officer with various duties, originally attending to scavage, fr. OE. & E. scavage. See Scavage, Show, v.] A person whose employment is to clean the streets of a city, by scraping or sweeping, and carrying off the filth. The name is also applied to any animal which devours refuse, carrion, or anything injurious to health.

Scavenger beetle (Zo["o]l.), any beetle which feeds on decaying substances, as the carrion beetle.

Scavenger crab (Zo["o]l.), any crab which feeds on dead animals, as the spider crab.

Scavenger's daughter [corrupt. of Skevington's daughter], an instrument of torture invented by Sir W. Skevington, which so compressed the body as to force the blood to flow from the nostrils, and sometimes from the hands and feet. --Am. Cyc.

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