Verb

To clean (a surface) by means of a motion of a broom or brush.

to sweep a floor, the street, or a chimney

* (Bible), (w) xiv. 23

I will sweep it with the besom of destruction.

To move through an (horizontal) arc or similar long stroke.

* 2005 , (Lesley Brown) (translator), Sophist by (Plato), :

[H]as the course of the argument so accustomed you to agreeing that you were swept by it into a ready assent?

To search (a place) methodically.

(figuratively) To travel quickly.

* {{quote-news, year=2011, date=February 1, author=Phil McNulty, work=BBC

, title= Arsenal 2-1 Everton , passage=Everton took that disputed lead in a moment that caused anger to sweep around the Emirates. }}

(cricket) To play a sweep shot.

(curling) To brush the ice in front of a moving stone, causing it to travel farther and to curl less.

(ergative) To move something in a particular motion, as a broom.

(sports) To win (a series) without drawing or losing any of the games in that series.

(sports) To defeat (a team) in a series without drawing or losing any of the games in that series.

To remove something abruptly and thoroughly.

The wind sweeps the snow from the hills.

The flooded river swept away the wooden dam.

* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-07, author= Ed Pilkington

, volume=188, issue=26, page=6, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= ‘Killer robots’ should be banned in advance, UN told , passage=In his submission to the UN, [Christof] Heyns points to the experience of drones. Unmanned aerial vehicles were intended initially only for surveillance, and their use for offensive purposes was prohibited, yet once strategists realised their perceived advantages as a means of carrying out targeted killings, all objections were swept out of the way.}}

To brush against or over; to rub lightly along.

* (John Dryden) (1631-1700)

Their long descending train, / With rubies edged and sapphires, swept the plain.

*

Mind you, clothes were clothes in those days. […]  Frills, ruffles, flounces, lace, complicated seams and gores: not only did they sweep the ground and have to be held up in one hand elegantly as you walked along, but they had little capes or coats or feather boas.

To carry with a long, swinging, or dragging motion; hence, to carry in a stately or proud fashion.

* (William Shakespeare) (c.1564–1616)

And like a peacock sweep along his tail.

To strike with a long stroke.

* (Alexander Pope) (1688-1744)

Wake into voice each silent string, / And sweep the sounding lyre.

(nautical) To draw or drag something over.

to sweep the bottom of a river with a net

To pass over, or traverse, with the eye or with an instrument of observation.

to sweep the heavens with a telescope

Verb

(en verb)

(lb) To move on the feet by alternately setting each foot (or pair or group of feet, in the case of animals with four or more feet) forward, with at least one foot on the ground at all times. Compare .

:

*

*:Athelstan Arundel walked home all the way, foaming and raging.His mother lived at Pembridge Square, which is four good measured miles from Lincoln's Inn. He walked the whole way, walking through crowds, and under the noses of dray-horses, carriage-horses, and cart-horses, without taking the least notice of them.

*, chapter=15

, title= The Mirror and the Lamp , passage=Edward Churchill still attended to his work in a hopeless mechanical manner like a sleep-walker who walks safely on a well-known round. But his Roman collar galled him, his cossack stifled him, his biretta was as uncomfortable as a merry-andrew's cap and bells.}}

To "walk free", i.e. to win, or avoid, a criminal court case, particularly when actually guilty.

:

Of an object, to be stolen.

:

To walk off the field, as if given out, after the fielding side appeals and before the umpire has ruled; done as a matter of sportsmanship when the batsman believes he is out.

(lb) To travel (a distance) by walking.

:

*

*:Athelstan Arundel walked' home all the way, foaming and raging.His mother lived at Pembridge Square, which is four good measured miles from Lincoln's Inn. He ' walked the whole way, walking through crowds, and under the noses of dray-horses, carriage-horses, and cart-horses, without taking the least notice of them.

(lb) To take for a walk or accompany on a walk.

:

*(William Shakespeare) (1564-1616)

*:I will rather trusta thief to walk my ambling gelding.

To allow a batter to reach base by pitching four balls.

(lb) To move something by shifting between two positions, as if it were walking.

:

(lb) To full; to beat cloth to give it the consistency of felt.

(lb) To traverse by walking (or analogous gradual movement).

:

To leave, resign.

:

*(Edmund Spenser) (c.1552–1599)

*:He will make their cows and garrans to walk .

(lb) To push (a vehicle) alongside oneself as one walks.

*1994 , John Forester, Bicycle Transportation: A Handbook for Cycling Transportation Engineers , MIT Press, p.245:

*:The county had a successful defense only because the judge kept telling the jury at every chance that the cyclist should have walked his bicycle like a pedestrian.

To behave; to pursue a course of life; to conduct oneself.

*(Jeremy Taylor) (1613–1677)

*:We walk' perversely with God, and he will ' walk crookedly toward us.

To be stirring; to be abroad; to go restlessly about; said of things or persons expected to remain quiet, such as a sleeping person, or the spirit of a dead person.

*(Hugh Latimer) (c.1485-1555)

*:I heard a pen walking in the chimney behind the cloth.

(lb) To be in motion; to act; to move.

*(Edmund Spenser) (c.1552–1599)

*:Her tongue did walk in foul reproach.

*(William Shakespeare) (1564-1616)

*:I have heard, but not believed, the spirits of the dead / May walk again.

*(Ben Jonson) (1572-1637)

*:Do you think I'd walk in any plot?