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scramble

Pronunciation: /ˈskɹæmbl̩/

The English word “scramble” has 20 meanings listed here.

verb

  1. To move hurriedly to a location, especially by using all limbs against a surface.
  2. To proceed to a location or an objective in a disorderly manner.
  3. To thoroughly combine and cook as a loose mass.
  4. To process telecommunication signals to make them unintelligible to an unauthorized listener.
  5. To mix up, to confuse, to mislead.
  6. To quickly deploy (vehicles, usually aircraft) to a destination in response to an alert, usually to intercept an attacking enemy.
  7. To be quickly deployed in this manner.
  8. To partake in motocross.
  9. To ascend rocky terrain as a leisure activity.
  10. To gather or collect by scrambling.
  11. To struggle eagerly with others for something thrown upon the ground; to go down upon all fours to seize something; to catch rudely at what is desired.
  12. To throw something down for others to compete for in this manner.
  13. To permute parts of a twisty puzzle (especially, Rubik's Cube) until it is ready to be solved from scratch.

noun

  1. A rush or hurry, especially making use of the limbs against a surface.
  2. An emergency defensive air force mission to intercept attacking enemy aircraft.
  3. A motocross race.
  4. Any frantic period of competitive activity.
  5. An impromptu maneuver or run by a quarterback, attempting to gain yardage or avoid being tackled behind the line of scrimmage.
  6. A statistic used in assessing a player's short game, consisting of a chip or putt from under 50 yards away that results in requiring one putt or less on the green.
  7. A variant of golf in which each player in a team tees off on each hole, and the players decide which shot was best. Every player then plays their second shot from within a club length of where the best ball has come to rest, and the procedure is repeated until the hole is finished.

Etymology

Origin uncertain. Perhaps from earlier dialectal scramble, scrammel (“to collect or rake together with the hands”), from scramb (“to pull or scrape together with the hands”) + -le (frequentative suffix) (compare Dutch schrammen (“to graze, brush, scratch”)); or alternatively from a nasalised form of scrabble (“to scrape or scratch quickly”).

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