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Spread   /sprɛd/   Listen
verb
Spread  v. t.  (past & past part. spread; pres. part. spreading)  
1.
To extend in length and breadth, or in breadth only; to stretch or expand to a broad or broader surface or extent; to open; to unfurl; as, to spread a carpet; to spread a tent or a sail. "He bought a parcel of a field where he had spread his tent." "Here the Rhone Hath spread himself a couch."
2.
To extend so as to cover something; to extend to a great or greater extent in every direction; to cause to fill or cover a wide or wider space. "Rose, as in a dance, the stately trees, and spread Their branches hung with copious fruit."
3.
To divulge; to publish, as news or fame; to cause to be more extensively known; to disseminate; to make known fully; as, to spread a report; often accompanied by abroad. "They, when they were departed, spread abroad his fame in all that country."
4.
To propagate; to cause to affect great numbers; as, to spread a disease.
5.
To diffuse, as emanations or effluvia; to emit; as, odoriferous plants spread their fragrance.
6.
To strew; to scatter over a surface; as, to spread manure; to spread lime on the ground.
7.
To prepare; to set and furnish with provisions; as, to spread a table. "Boiled the flesh, and spread the board."
To spread cloth, to unfurl sail. (Obs.)
Synonyms: To diffuse; propagate; disperse; publish; distribute; scatter; circulate; disseminate; dispense.


Spread  v. i.  (past & past part. spread; pres. part. spreading)  
1.
To extend in length and breadth in all directions, or in breadth only; to be extended or stretched; to expand. "Plants, if they spread much, are seldom tall." "Governor Winthrop, and his associates at Charlestown, had for a church a large, spreading tree."
2.
To be extended by drawing or beating; as, some metals spread with difficulty.
3.
To be made known more extensively, as news.
4.
To be propagated from one to another; as, the disease spread into all parts of the city.


Spread  v.  Imp. & p. p. of Spread, v.
Spread eagle.
(a)
An eagle with outspread wings, the national emblem of the United States.
(b)
The figure of an eagle, with its wings elevated and its legs extended; often met as a device upon military ornaments, and the like.
(c)
(Her.) An eagle displayed; an eagle with the wings and legs extended on each side of the body, as in the double-headed eagle of Austria and Russia. See Displayed, 2.


noun
Spread  n.  
1.
Extent; compass. "I have got a fine spread of improvable land."
2.
Expansion of parts. "No flower hath spread like that of the woodbine."
3.
A cloth used as a cover for a table or a bed.
4.
A table, as spread or furnished with a meal; hence, an entertainment of food; a feast. (Colloq.)
5.
A privilege which one person buys of another, of demanding certain shares of stock at a certain price, or of delivering the same shares of stock at another price, within a time agreed upon. (Brokers' Cant)
6.
(Geom.) An unlimited expanse of discontinuous points.
7.
(Finance) An arbitrage transaction operated by buying and selling simultaneously in two separate markets, as Chicago and New York, when there is an abnormal difference in price between the two markets. It is called a back spreadwhen the difference in price is less than the normal one.
8.
(Gems) Surface in proportion to the depth of a cut stone.





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Spread" Quotes from Famous Books



... Zary proceeded to walk up the stairs, turning up the lights as he went. He called the name of Beth softly three or four times, and presently a door opened overhead and a girl in a white dress came out. A pleased smile spread over her face as she looked over the balusters and noted ...
— The Mystery of the Four Fingers • Fred M. White
... Eagle intends to do. His section of the tribe is pretty considerable strong, and although at present I aint heard that any others have joined, these Injuns are like barrels of gunpowder: when the spark is once struck there's no saying how far the explosion may spread. When one band of 'em sees as how another is taking scalps and getting plunder and honor, they all want to be at the same work. I reckon War Eagle has got some two hundred braves who will follow him; but when the news spreads that he has begun his work, all the ...
— True to the Old Flag - A Tale of the American War of Independence • G. A. Henty
... immense depth, enclosed on all sides by a range of magnificent mountain precipices, the sides and summit of which are broken in every variety of buttress or pinnacle—now black and craggy and beetling—at other times spread with the richest green turf, and scattered with a profusion of the evergreen forest-trees, indigenous to the island; while far below, in the midst of all these horrors, smiles a fairy region of cultivation and fruitfulness, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 10, Issue 267, August 4, 1827 • Various
... eyes fixed themselves and the moaning began and continued. John was horror-struck and stood for a moment gazing at his face, over which the deep flush had spread once more, seeming to obliterate all appearance of intelligence. Then the young man put his hand beneath Goddard's head and gently replaced him in his former position, smoothing the pillows, and giving him ...
— A Tale of a Lonely Parish • F. Marion Crawford
... derived from a few little chinks in the apex of the roof. During the first freezing nights of late fall the beavers plaster the above-water dome of their house with mud which they carry up between their forelegs and chin from the lake bottom, and placing it upon the roof of their house, spread it about in a thick coating, not with their tails, but with their forefeet, where it soon freezes into so solid a mass that it protects the inmates from the attacks of both the severest winter weather and the most savage ...
— The Drama of the Forests - Romance and Adventure • Arthur Heming


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