Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The gait of a horse or other four-footed animal, between a walk and a canter in speed, in which diagonal pairs of legs move forward together.
  • noun A ride on a horse moving with this gait.
  • noun A gait of a person, faster than a walk; a jog.
  • noun Sports A race for trotters.
  • noun Informal Diarrhea. Used with the.
  • noun A toddler.
  • noun Archaic An old woman.
  • intransitive verb To go or move at a trot.
  • intransitive verb To proceed rapidly; hurry.
  • intransitive verb To cause to move at a trot.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun An old woman: a term of disparagement.
  • To go at a quick, steady pace; run; go.
  • Specifically, to go at the quick, steady pace known as a trot. See trot, n., 2, and trotter.
  • To cause to trot; ride at a trot.
  • To ride over or about at a trot.
  • To use a “pony” or some similar means in studying; “pony”: as, to trot a lesson. [College slang, U. S.]
  • noun Quick, steady movement; “go”: as, to keep one on the trot all day.
  • noun A gait faster than the walk and slower than the run.
  • noun A toddling child; in general, a child: a term of endearment.
  • noun A “pony”; a “crib.”
  • noun A trot-line.
  • noun A small line that sets off from the main trot-line, to The extreme end of which the hook is fastened. See trotline.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The pace of a horse or other quadruped, more rapid than a walk, but of various degrees of swiftness, in which one fore foot and the hind foot of the opposite side are lifted at the same time.
  • noun Fig.: A jogging pace, as of a person hurrying.
  • noun One who trots; a child; a woman.
  • transitive verb To cause to move, as a horse or other animal, in the pace called a trot; to cause to run without galloping or cantering.
  • transitive verb [Slang.] to lead or bring out, as a horse, to show his paces; hence, to bring forward, as for exhibition.
  • intransitive verb To proceed by a certain gait peculiar to quadrupeds; to ride or drive at a trot. See trot, n.
  • intransitive verb Fig.: To run; to jog; to hurry.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A gait of a four-legged animal between walk and canter, a diagonal gait (in which diagonally opposite pairs of legs move together).
  • noun A gait of a person faster than a walk.
  • noun dance A moderately rapid dance.
  • noun Short for Trotskyist.
  • noun Australia, obsolete A succession of heads thrown in a game of two-up.
  • noun Australia, New Zealand A run of luck or fortune.
  • verb To walk rapidly.
  • verb of a horse To move at a gait between a walk and a canter.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun radicals who support Trotsky's theory that socialism must be established throughout the world by continuing revolution
  • verb ride at a trot
  • verb cause to trot
  • noun a slow pace of running
  • noun a literal translation used in studying a foreign language (often used illicitly)
  • verb run at a moderately swift pace
  • noun a gait faster than a walk; diagonally opposite legs strike the ground together

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, from Old French, from troter, to trot, of Germanic origin. N., sense 7, origin unknown.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English trotten, from Old French trotter, troter ("to go, trot"), from Medieval Latin *trottāre, *trotāre ("to go"), from Frankish *trottōn (“to go, run”), from Proto-Germanic *trudōnan, *trudanan, *tradjanan (“to go, step, tread”), from Proto-Indo-European *dreu-, *derə-, *drā- (“to run, escape”). Cognate with Old High German trottōn ("to run"), Modern German trotten ("to trot, plod"), Gothic 𐍄𐍂𐌿𐌳𐌰𐌽 (trudan, "to tread"), Old Norse troða ("to walk, tread"), Old English tredan ("to step, tread"). More at tread.

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Examples

  • Quoth he, “The swindling old trot is no mother of mine; she hath cheated me and taken my clothes and a thousand dinars.”

    The Book of The Thousand Nights And A Night 2006

  • The road smoked in the twilight with children driving home cattle from the fields; and a pair of mounted stride-legged women, hat and cap and all, dashed past me at a hammering trot from the canton where they had been to church and market.

    Travels With A Donkey In The Cevennes 1879

  • The road smoked in the twilight with children driving home cattle from the fields; and a pair of mounted stride-legged women, hat and cap and all, dashed past me at a hammering trot from the canton where they had been to church and market.

    The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 1 (of 25) Robert Louis Stevenson 1872

  • The road smoked in the twilight with children driving home cattle from the fields; and a pair of mounted stride-legged women, hat and cap and all, dashed past me at a hammering trot from the canton where they had been to church and market.

    Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes Robert Louis Stevenson 1872

  • His heels touch Vola's flanks; the black snorts but picks up her feet into a quick trot, which is the most Creslin wants over the rough ground above the dunes, where a half-squad holds the high sand against twice as many Nordlans.

    The Towers of the Sunset Modesitt, L. E. 1992

  • He has a fox trot, which is wonderfully easy, and which he apparently can keep up indefinitely, and like all Indian horses can "run like a deer."

    Army Letters from an Officer's Wife, 1871-1888 Frances Marie Antoinette Mack Roe

  • A lope is easier to ride, but the trot is the natural gait of a horse, and he can keep up

    Pluck on the Long Trail Boy Scouts in the Rockies 1911

  • If the trot had been the rhythmic _one, two, three, four_, Pete could have ridden and rolled cigarettes without spilling a flake of tobacco; but the trot was a sort of _one, two -- almost three_, then, whump!

    The Ridin' Kid from Powder River Henry Herbert Knibbs 1909

  • The trot, sir '' (striking his Bucephalus with his spurs), --- ` ` the trot is the true pace for a hackney; and, were we near a town, I should like to try that daisy-cutter of yours upon a piece of level road (barring canter) for a quart of claret at the next inn. ''

    Rob Roy 1887

  • The upper part of his form, notwithstanding the season required no such defence, was shrouded in a large great-coat, belted over his under habiliments, and crested with a huge cowl of the same stale, which, when drawn over the head and hat, completely overshadowed both, and being buttoned beneath the chin, was called a trot-cozy.

    The Waverley 1877

  • This is ppongjjak – a revitalisation of a century-old Korean pop genre otherwise known as trot.

    ‘It’s like oxygen – it’s everywhere!’ Why Korea is hot for trot, the cheesiest pop imaginable James Balmont in Seoul 2022

  • The hippo footage showed the animals, which can reach more than 2,000kg, typically trot, a movement that involves diagonally opposite legs moving in synchrony.

    Hippos might fly: UK research discovers animal can get airborne 2022

Comments

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  • Tort in reverse.

    July 22, 2007

  • A hag.

    April 23, 2011