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waster - 4 dictionary results
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wast⋅er

  [wey-ster]
Use waster in a Sentence
–noun
1. a person or thing that wastes time, money, etc.
2. a piece of ceramic ware warped, cracked, or melted during firing.
3. a spendthrift or wastrel.
4. a destroyer: The Vandals were wasters of cities.
5. Chiefly British. wastrel (def. 2).
Origin:
1300–50; ME < AF wastere, wastour (see -or 2 ); later understood as waste + -er 1

waste

  [weyst] verb, wast⋅ed, wast⋅ing, noun, adjective
–verb (used with object)
1. to consume, spend, or employ uselessly or without adequate return; use to no avail or profit; squander: to waste money; to waste words.
2. to fail or neglect to use: to waste an opportunity.
3. to destroy or consume gradually; wear away: The waves waste the rock of the shore.
4. to wear down or reduce in bodily substance, health, or strength; emaciate; enfeeble: to be wasted by disease or hunger.
5. to destroy, devastate, or ruin: a country wasted by a long and futile war.
6. Slang. to kill or murder.
–verb (used without object)
7. to be consumed, spent, or employed uselessly or without giving full value or being fully utilized or appreciated.
8. to become gradually consumed, used up, or worn away: A candle wastes in burning.
9. to become physically worn; lose flesh or strength; become emaciated or enfeebled.
10. to diminish gradually; dwindle, as wealth, power, etc.: The might of England is wasting.
11. to pass gradually, as time.
–noun
12. useless consumption or expenditure; use without adequate return; an act or instance of wasting: The project was a waste of material, money, time, and energy.
13. neglect, instead of use: waste of opportunity.
14. gradual destruction, impairment, or decay: the waste and repair of bodily tissue.
15. devastation or ruin, as from war or fire.
16. a region or place devastated or ruined: The forest fire left a blackened waste.
17. anything unused, unproductive, or not properly utilized.
18. an uncultivated tract of land.
19. a wild region or tract of land; desolate country, desert, or the like.
20. an empty, desolate, or dreary tract or extent: a waste of snow.
21. anything left over or superfluous, as excess material or by-products, not of use for the work in hand: a fortune made in salvaging factory wastes.
22. remnants, as from the working of cotton, used for wiping machinery, absorbing oil, etc.
23. Physical Geography. material derived by mechanical and chemical disintegration of rock, as the detritus transported by streams, rivers, etc.
24. garbage; refuse.
25. wastes, excrement.
–adjective
26. not used or in use: waste energy; waste talents.
27. (of land, regions, etc.) wild, desolate, barren, or uninhabited; desert.
28. (of regions, towns, etc.) in a state of desolation and ruin, as from devastation or decay.
29. left over or superfluous: to utilize waste products of manufacture.
30. having served or fulfilled a purpose; no longer of use.
31. rejected as useless or worthless; refuse: to salvage waste products.
32. Physiology. pertaining to material unused by or unusable to the organism.
33. designed or used to receive, hold, or carry away excess, superfluous, used, or useless material (often in combination): a waste pipe; waste container.
34. Obsolete. excessive; needless.
—Idioms
35. go to waste, to fail to be used or consumed; be wasted: She hates to see good food go to waste.
36. lay waste, to devastate; destroy; ruin: Forest fires lay waste thousands of acres yearly.
Origin:
1150–1200; 1960–65 for def. 6; (adj.) ME < ONF wast (OF g(u)ast) < L vāstus desolate; (v.) ME < ONF waster (OF g(u)aster) < L vāstāre, deriv. of vāstus; (n.) ME < ONF wast(e) (OF g(u)aste), partly < L vāstum, n. use of neut. of vāstus, partly deriv. of waster; ONF w-, OF gu- by influence of c. Frankish *wōsti desolate (c. OHG wuosti)

Related forms:
wast⋅a⋅ble, adjective
wasteless, adjective

Synonyms:
1. misspend, dissipate, fritter away, expend. 3. erode. 5. ravage, pillage, plunder, sack, spoil, despoil. 10. decline, perish, wane, decay. 12. dissipation. 14. diminution, decline, emaciation, consumption. 15. spoliation, desolation. 19. See desert 1 . 24. rubbish, trash. 36. See ravage. 28. ruined, ghostly, destroyed. 29. unused, useless, extra.

Antonyms:
1. save.
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
Cite This Source Link To waster
wast·er   (wā'stər)   
n.  
  1. One that wastes: a waster of time; a waster of money.
  2. One that lays waste; a destroyer: a waster of enemy cities.
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
Cite This Source

Waster

Wast"er\, n. [OE. wastour, OF. wasteor, gasteor. See Waste, v. t.]

1. One who, or that which, wastes; one who squanders; one who consumes or expends extravagantly; a spendthrift; a prodigal.

He also that is slothful in his work is brother to him that is a great waster. --Prov. xviii. 9.

Sconces are great wasters of candles. --Swift.

2. An imperfection in the wick of a candle, causing it to waste; -- called also a thief. --Halliwell.

3. A kind of cudgel; also, a blunt-edged sword used as a foil.

Half a dozen of veneys at wasters with a good fellow for a broken head. --Beau. & Fl.

Being unable to wield the intellectual arms of reason, they are fain to betake them unto wasters. --Sir T. Browne.
Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.
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