| 释义 |
▪ I. clutter, n.|ˈklʌtə(r)|
[This and the vb. of same form appear to have arisen late in the 16th c. and to have become suddenly very common, after which they went to a great extent out of literary use, though retained in some senses dialectally, and in U.S.
In sense 1 the word was evidently a phonetic variant of clotter, from clot (which had occas. the form clut). Afterwards, influenced perh. by association with cluster, it was taken to mean ‘an assemblage, crowd, medley’; and still later, perh. by association with clatter, the notion of noise entered in, so as to give the sense of mingled and confused noise (cf. EFris. klöter a rattle, klötern to rattle).]
†1. A clotted mass; coagulation; = clotter, clodder, cludder. Obs.
1580Hollyband Treas. Fr. Tong, Grumeleux, full of clots or clutters. 1611Cotgr., Thrombes de sang, clots or clutters of congealed bloud.
2. a. A collected mass, a collection; a crowded and confused assemblage.
1666J. Sergeant Letter of Thanks 125 You huddle together a clutter of Citations. 1670Cotton Espernon iii. xii. 618 Impossible to have found so little a thing, in so great a clutter of thick, and deep Grass. 1674N. Fairfax Bulk & Selv. 99 The world or whole clutter of bodies. 1791Cowper Comm. Milton Wks. 1837 XV. 304 A clutter of consonants with only a single vowel to assist their utterance. 1792A. Young Trav. France 133 All is a clutter of narrow, crooked, dark, and dirty lanes. 1891Harper's Mag. Nov. 881/2 A tiny clutter of frame houses and tents. 1958Times 4 July 11/4 The home of Everyman will be free from a clutter of sporting equipment and reading matter, tools and toys.
b. Crowded confusion; ‘litter’.
1694R. L'Estrange Fables cxx. (1714) 137 He saw what a Clutter there was with huge, over-grown Pots. a1825Forby Voc. E. Anglia, Clutter, confusion, disorder. In our use of the word, there is no idea of ‘noise, clamour or bustle’... ‘The room is in a clutter’, if the tables and chairs stand in disorder. a1864Hawthorne Dr. Grimshawe's Secret 292 The musty and dusty clutter and litter of things gone by. 1884Boston (Mass.) Jrnl. 31 Dec. 4/2 To-day all the clutter of the aisles was removed and the fair presented..a more regular and orderly arrangement of exhibits. 1959Daily Tel. 10 Mar. 16/4 Mr. Brooke..said in London yesterday that Britain had ‘got to get rid of the clutter’ of advertisements on shops and elsewhere. Ibid., By one method or another I intend to get rid of clutter, for I am sure it does no good to anyone.
c. Unwanted images on a radar screen.
1945in Army & Navy Jrnl. (U.S.) 18 Aug. 1534. 1946 Electronic Engin. XVIII. 267 Sea clutter, caused by echoes from the tips of waves and broken water. 1948Ibid. XX. 336 The important subject of unwanted echoes (‘clutter’). 1967Electronics 6 Mar. 52/2 Blind spots caused when the transmitter pulse or clutter obliterates the target return pulse.
3. The crowded confusion of movement and business; turmoil, bustle, stir. Also in phr. in a clutter. arch. or dial.
1649Ambrose Media v. (1652) 104 What a clutter of businesses crossing one the other. 1704Swift T. Tub iv. (1709) 73 In the midst of all this clutter and revolution in comes Peter. 1723De Foe Col. Jack (1840) 192 By the hurry and clutter they were in to get all ready for a fight. a1734North Exam. i. ii. ⁋135 (1740) 105 What Clutter there was in Town about getting off. 1768E. Buys Dict. Terms Art, A Clutter, a Bustle or Stir. 1890Blackw. Mag. CXLVIII. 463/2 Up spring the partridges;..all in a clutter they are, one over the other.
4. Noisy turmoil or disturbance, hubbub. (Cf. clatter.) arch. or dial.
1656W. Coles Art of Simpling 8 What those things were which..Leah and Rachel kept such a clutter about. 1669W. Simpson Hydrol. Chym. 348 All the clutter will be hush'd. 1727Swift To Very Young Lady, Those ladies, who are apt to make the greatest clutter on such occasions. 1778Camp Guide 14 That for mere religion, there should be such a clutter. 1823Scott Peveril xxxv, The dwarf..making a most important clutter as he extinguished their fire.
5. A noise consisting of the disorderly mixture of many rapid and more or less simultaneous sounds; mingled rattle. (Cf. clatter.) arch. or dial.
1655T. Bayly Bp. Fisher xiv. 102 A Cannon bullet..made such a horrible noyse and clutter, as it went thorough. 1670Milton Hist. Eng. ii. Wks., 1738 II. 16 The clutter of their Horse, and of their Wheels. 1702Vanbrugh False Friend v. i, I heard such a clutter of small shot—‘Murder! murder! murder! rape! fire!’ a1748Watts Disc. Educ. ii, Let [children] be instructed not to speak in a swift hurry, with a tumult of syllables and clutter upon their lips. 1841L. Hunt Seer (1864) 41 Now and then comes a clutter of drops against the glass, made by a gust of wind.
6. Comb., clutter-clutter, continuous or repeated noise or clatter; clutterdepouch, an obsolete dance; clutter-fisted a., ? clumsy-handed: cf. cluster-fisted.
1608R. Armin Nest Ninn. (1842) 27 Clutter fisted, long of arme, Bodied straight and slender'd. 1641Brome Joviall Crew ii. Wks. 1873 III. 371 Daunce Clutterdepouch; and Hannykin booby. 1691Hist. Relat. Gen. Assembly Edin. 49 A Clutter Clutter of words and canting phrases which cannot be understood.
▪ II. ˈclutter, v.
[Goes with the n., q.v.]
†1. intr. To run together in clots; to clot, coagulate. Also trans. = clotter v. i. Obs.
1601Holland Pliny xii. xvii, It battereth and cluttereth into knots and balls. Ibid. xxv. xiii. (R.), It killith them..by congealing and cluttering their bloud. 1633Rogers Treat. Sacram. ii. 129 Their sinne..lies cluttered in their soules. 1676True Gentlewoman's Delight (N.), To make cream clutter.
2. To run together or collect in knots or heaps; to crowd together. (Quot. 1598 connects with 3.)
1556J. Heywood Spider & F. li. 6 The spiders, togither clustring and cluttring. 1598R. Grenewey Tacitus' Ann. xi. x. (1622) 152 All the rest came cluttering about [circumstrepunt] him, crying that he should haste away to the Campe. 1610Rowlands Mart. Mark-all 45 To whom..masterlesse men after they heard of his fame, came cluttering on heapes. a1734North Exam. iii. vii. ⁋88 Villainy..clutters together in Heaps, and where you find one, all the rest are not far.
3. To run in crowded and bustling disorder.
1602Hist. Eng. in Harl. Misc. (Malh.) II. 455 The middle of the field was filled with chariots, and horsemen, cluttering and running round about. 1724De Foe Mem. Cavalier (1840) 195 The coaches, horsemen and crowd, cluttered away, to be out of harm's way. 1759Sterne Tr. Shandy I. 2 Away they go cluttering like hey-go mad. 1824–9Landor Imag. Conv. (1846) II. 236 They clutter and run and rise and escape from him.
4. To run or move with noise of bustle and confusion; to make a confused noise or clatter.
1693W. Robertson Phraseol. Gen. 342 To clutter or clatter. 1768E. Buys Dict. Terms Art, To Clutter, to make a noise or hurly burly. 1808J. Mayne Siller Gun, The coffee-cups began to clutter. 1833Tennyson Goose vii, It clutter'd here, it chuckled there.
†5. trans. To heap or crowd together in a disorderly way. Obs. or dial.
a1631Donne Lett. (1651) 32 Which clutters not Prayses together. 1685Cotton Montaigne III. 190 We cannot make ourselves sure of the Supream Cause, and therefore clutter a great many together, to see if it may not accidentally be among them. a1786J. Collier (Tim Bobbin) Wks. 46 All the teawn were cluttert abeawt us.
6. To crowd (a place or space) with a disorderly assemblage of things. Usu. in pass. Freq. const. up.
1674N. Fairfax Bulk & Selv. 127 [Lest] any stragling bodies clutter up its rooms and stifle it. 1685Visit. Archdeaconry Ely in Camb. Antiq. Communic. III. 346 The Chancell soe clutterd up wth a great Monumt that it leaves noe Room for y⊇ Comunion Table. 1854Thoreau Walden ii. (1886) 90 An unwieldy and overgrown establishment, cluttered with furniture. 1874Sussex Gloss., To clutter up, to throw into confusion: to crowd. 1885Boston (Mass.) Jrnl. 8 Jan. 1/6 At present the sides of the highways..are cluttered with these pipes. 1908Daily Chron. 25 Feb. 4/4 The floor also was cluttered with papers and books of every kind. 1910Westm. Gaz. 6 Apr. 2/1 The Second Chamber is now cluttered up with a brute mass of undistinguished bipeds. 1914H. H. Fyfe Real Mexico 92 The lines here are all cluttered up with troop-trains. 1923Times Lit. Suppl. 18 Jan. 36/2 The book is cluttered up with details of the number of troops present and tables of the exceedingly minute casualties. 1966Oxf. Univ. Gaz. 23 Dec. 434/1 We do not want to clutter up Congregation with a large number of trivial details.
7. To throw into mental confusion and disorder. Now dial. and U.S.
1685Trial Lady A. Lisle in State Trials XI. 297 Witness. My lord, I am so baulked I do not know what I say myself—Tell me what you would have me to say, for I am cluttered out of my senses. 1888Detroit Free Press, I've seed strange things in my time, but this clutters me!
8. To utter words confusedly and hurriedly: often, as a habitual defect of utterance; cf. clutterer.
1654Trapp Comm. Job i. 19 This messenger cluttereth out all at once. 1656Lovelace Lucasta (1659) 73 (T.) All that they Bluster'd and clutter'd wisely for, you play. 1813W. Taylor Eng. Synonyms (1856) 254 Spoken with syllabic distinctness..articulated, and not cluttered. 1878tr. Ziemssen's Cycl. Med. XIV. 817 A young preacher who cluttered very badly. |