Erratic vs Spring - What's the difference?
erratic | spring |
unsteady, random; prone to unexpected changes; not consistent
Deviating from the common course in opinion or conduct; eccentric; odd.
(geology) A rock moved from one location to another, usually by a glacier.
* 2003 , (Bill Bryson), A Short History of Nearly Everything , BCA 2003, p. 372:
Anything that has erratic characteristics.
To jump or leap.
* Philips
* 1900 , , (The Wonderful Wizard of Oz)
* 1912 : (Edgar Rice Burroughs), (Tarzan of the Apes), Chapter 5
* 1922 , (Virginia Woolf), (w, Jacob's Room) Chapter 2
To pass over by leaping.
To produce or disclose unexpectedly, especially of surprises, traps, etc.
* Dryden
* Jonathan Swift
* 29 February 2012 , Aidan Foster-Carter, BBC News
(slang) To release or set free, especially from prison.
To come into being, often quickly or sharply.
*
, title=(The Celebrity), chapter=1
, passage=However, with the dainty volume my quondam friend sprang into fame. At the same time he cast off the chrysalis of a commonplace existence.}}
* {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham), title=(The China Governess)
, chapter=17 To start or rise suddenly, as from a covert.
* Otway
To cause to spring up; to start or rouse, as game; to cause to rise from the earth, or from a covert.
To crack or split; to bend or strain so as to weaken.
To bend by force, as something stiff or strong; to force or put by bending, as a beam into its sockets, and allowing it to straighten when in place; often with in'', ''out , etc.
To issue with speed and violence; to move with activity; to dart; to shoot.
* Dryden
To fly back.
To bend from a straight direction or plane surface; to become warped.
To shoot up, out, or forth; to come to the light; to begin to appear; to emerge, like a plant from its seed, a stream from its source, etc.; often followed by up'', ''forth'', or ''out .
* Bible, Job xxxviii. 27
* Rowe
* Alexander Pope
To issue or proceed, as from a parent or ancestor; to result, as from a cause, motive, reason, or principle.
* Milton
(obsolete) To grow; to prosper.
* Dryden
To build (an arch).
To sound (a rattle, such as a watchman's rattle).
* 1850 , Samuel Prout Newcombe, Pleasant pages (page 197)
A leap; a bound; a jump.
* Dryden
(countable) Traditionally the first of the four seasons of the year in temperate regions, in which plants spring from the ground and trees come into blossom, following winter and preceding summer.
(countable) Meteorologically, the months of March, April and May in the northern hemisphere (or September, October and November in the southern).
* {{quote-magazine, year=2012, month=March-April
, author=Anna Lena Phillips
, title=Sneaky Silk Moths
, volume=100, issue=2, page=172
, magazine=(American Scientist)
(countable) The astronomically delineated period from the moment of vernal equinox, approximately March 21 in the northern hemisphere to the moment of the summer solstice, approximately June 21. (See for other variations.)
(countable) Spring tide; a tide of greater-than-average range, that is, around the first or third quarter of a lunar month, or around the times of the new or full moon.
(countable) A place where water emerges from the ground.
(uncountable) The property of a body of springing to its original form after being compressed, stretched, etc.
Elastic power or force.
* Dryden
(countable) A mechanical device made of flexible or coiled material that exerts force when it is bent, compressed or stretched.
(countable, slang) An erection of the penis.
(countable) The source of an action or of a supply.
* 1748 . David Hume. Enquiries concerning the human understanding and concerning the principles of moral. London: Oxford University Press, 1973, § 9.
* Bible, Psalms lxxxvii
* Bentley
Any active power; that by which action, or motion, is produced or propagated; cause; origin; motive.
* Alexander Pope
That which springs, or is originated, from a source.
# A race; lineage.
# A youth; a springald.
# A shoot; a plant; a young tree; also, a grove of trees; woodland.
(obsolete) That which causes one to spring; specifically, a lively tune.
The time of growth and progress; early portion; first stage.
* Bible, 1 Sam. ix. 26
* Shakespeare
(countable, nautical) A rope attaching the bow of a vessel to the stern-side of the jetty, or vice versa, to stop the vessel from surging.
(nautical) A line led from a vessel's quarter to her cable so that by tightening or slacking it she can be made to lie in any desired position; a line led diagonally from the bow or stern of a vessel to some point upon the wharf to which she is moored.
(nautical) A crack or fissure in a mast or yard, running obliquely or transversely.
As an adjective erratic
is unsteady, random; prone to unexpected changes; not consistent.As a noun erratic
is (geology) a rock moved from one location to another, usually by a glacier.As a proper noun spring is
spring, the season of warmth and new vegetation following winter.erratic
English
Alternative forms
* erratick, erraticke, erratique (obsolete)Adjective
(en adjective)- Henry has been getting erratic scores on his tests: 40% last week, but 98% this week.
- erratic conduct
Derived terms
* erraticallyAntonyms
* consistentNoun
(en noun)- The term for a displaced boulder is an erratic , but in the nineteenth century the expression seemed to apply more often to the theories than to the rocks.
Anagrams
*spring
English
Verb
- The mountain stag that springs / From height to height, and bounds along the plains.
- She was awakened by a shock, so sudden and severe that if Dorothy had not been lying on the soft bed she might have been hurt. As it was, the jar made her catch her breath and wonder what had happened; and Toto put his cold little nose into her face and whined dismally. Dorothy sat up and noticed that the house was not moving; nor was it dark, for the bright sunshine came in at the window, flooding the little room. She sprang from her bed and with Toto at her heels ran and opened the door.
- Not thirty paces behind the two she crouched—Sabor, the huge lioness—lashing her tail. Cautiously she moved a great padded paw forward, noiselessly placing it before she lifted the next. Thus she advanced; her belly low, almost touching the surface of the ground — a great cat preparing to spring upon its prey.
- Archer and Jacob jumped up from behind the mound where they had been crouching with the intention of springing upon their mother unexpectedly, and they all began to walk slowly home.
- to spring over a fence (in this sense, the verb spring must be accompanied by the preposition 'over'.)
- She starts, and leaves her bed, amd springs a light.
- The friends to the cause sprang a new project.
North Korea: The denuclearisation dance resumes
- North Korea loves to spring surprises. More unusual is for its US foe to play along.
citation, passage=The face which emerged was not reassuring. It was blunt and grey, the nose springing thick and flat from high on the frontal bone of the forehead, whilst his eyes were narrow slits of dark in a tight bandage of tissue.
- watchful as fowlers when their game will spring
- to spring a pheasant
- to spring a mast or a yard
- to spring in a slat or a bar
- And sudden light / Sprung through the vaulted roof.
- A bow, when bent, springs back by its elastic power.
- A piece of timber, or a plank, sometimes springs in seasoning.
- to satisfy the desolate and waste ground, and to cause the bud of the tender herb to spring forth
- Do not blast my springing hopes.
- O, spring to light; auspicious Babe, be born.
- [They found] new hope to spring / Out of despair, joy, but with fear yet linked.
- What makes all this, but Jupiter the king, / At whose command we perish, and we spring ?
- They sprung an arch over the lintel.
- I do not know how John and his mistress would have settled the fate of the thief, but just at this moment a policeman entered — for the cook had sprung the rattle, and had been screaming "Murder" and "Thieves."
Usage notes
* The past-tense forms sprang and sprung are both well attested historically. In modern usage, as a past participle is attested, but is no longer in standard use.Synonyms
* bound, jump, leap * (release or set free) free, let out, release, spring looseDerived terms
* hope springs eternal * outspring * overspring * respring * spring a butt * spring an arch * spring a leak * spring a rattle * spring at * springel * springer * spring for * spring forth * spring-hare * spring in * springing * spring into action * spring-jack * spring-lobster * spring loose * spring on * spring the luff * spring to life * spring to mind * spring-tree * spring up * upspringNoun
- The prisoner, with a spring , from prison broke.
- Spring is the time of the year most species reproduce.
- I spent my spring holidays in Morocco.
- You can visit me in the spring , when the weather is bearable.
citation, passage=Last spring , the periodical cicadas emerged across eastern North America. Their vast numbers and short above-ground life spans inspired awe and irritation in humans—and made for good meals for birds and small mammals.}}
- This water is bottled from the spring of the river.
- the spring of a bow
- Heavens! what a spring was in his arm!
- We jumped so hard the bed springs broke.
- ... discover, at least in some degree, the secret springs and principles, by which the human mind is actuated in its operations?
- All my springs are in thee.
- A secret spring of spiritual joy.
- Our author shuns by vulgar springs to move / The hero's glory, or the virgin's love.
- (Chapman)
- (Spenser)
- (Spenser)
- (Milton)
- (Beaumont and Fletcher)
- The spring of the day.
- O how this spring of love resembleth / The uncertain glory of an April day.
- You should put a couple of springs onto the jetty to stop the boat moving so much.