Sprawl

Rhymes: -É”Ël

From Middle English spraulen, from Old English spreawlian. Compare North Frisian spraweli.

Full definition of sprawl

1888, w, The Man Who Would Be King, and Other Stories Chapter Baa Baa, Black Sheep, There was no special place for him or his little affairs, and he was forbidden to sprawl on sofas and explain his ideas about the manufacture of this world and his hopes for the future. Sprawling was lazy and wore out sofas, and little boys were not expected to talk.
1942, Louise Dickinson Rich, We Took to the Woods Chapter â€œDo You Get Out Very Often?â€, But most of all I like to sit in the dark with all these hearty souls sprawled around me on the floor and hear them talk. I am sorry to say that I can never believe that floor-sprawling is anything but a pose; I have tried it and it is not comfortable but it looks well in the flickering fire-light, and is in good magazine-story tradition.
1979, Thomas S. Spradley, James P. Spradley, Deaf Like Me, There were pillows on the floor, a few chairs, and four or five students sprawled here and there watching a football game.

1771, Johann Reinhold Foster, A Voyage to China and the East Indies, volume 2 Chapter Birds and Beasts, The hatched young ones are Å¿odl to thoÅ¿e who breed them up, and theÅ¿e try in the following manner whether they are hatched too Å¿oon or not: they take hold the little ducks by the bill, and their bodies hang down ; if they Å¿prawl and extend their feet and wings, they are hatched in due time ; but if they have had too much heat, they hang without any Å¿truggling.
1914, w, Cross Trails: The Story of One Woman in the North Woods, A shrewd blow, it caught him off balance, and after one ineffectual stagger he sprawled backward and lay for a moment staring up in blank surprise
1995, James H. Hallas, Squandered Victory: the American First Army at St. Mihiel Chapter Eyes on Metz, German trucks stood along the road, the drivers dead in the seats or sprawled on the ground nearby. ... The woods were dotted with the corpses of German machine gunners still sprawled grotesquely over their weapons, having given their lives to buy time for Group Mihielâ€™s escape.
2011, October 1, Clive Lindsay, Kilmarnock 1 - 2 St Johnstone, Bell sprawled full length to turn a Sandaza drive wide of the far post, but Saints had done enough to inflict Killie's first home defeat of the season.

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2006, Anthony Flint, The Land: The Battle Over Sprawl and the Future of America, Getting people to think about the future is difficult. Just ask some of teh people who end up being most concerned about sprawlâ€”the millions who move into suburban subdivisions, only to have their dreams of the good life spoiled by maddening traffic and water bans, because millions more moved into the next subdivision over.
1959, August 17, 1959, William H. Whye Jr., A Plan to Save Vanishing U.S. Countryside, Many of our past difficulties in dealing with sprawl come from some very mistaken if widely held assumptions. One is that sprawl is due to too many people and not enough land.
1948, October 1948, Terry B. Augur, The Dispersal of Citiesâ€”A Feasible Program, He brieflt compares the relative merits of providing for that growth by the ususal method of urban sprawl and by directing it into suburban satellite communitites with the integrity preserved adn comes out strongly for the latter method.