range
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /ɹeɪnd͡ʒ/
rhymes: -eɪndʒ
Forms: form: ranges
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form: ranging
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form: ranged
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form: ranged
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Etymology: From Middle English rengen, from Old French rengier (“to range, to rank, to order,”), from the noun renc, reng, ranc, rang (“a rank, row”), from Frankish *hring, from Proto-Germanic *hringaz (“ring, circle, curve”). Doublet of ring.
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glosses: To travel over (an area, etc); to roam, wander.
examples: text: to range the fields
text: Novv to the copſe thy leſſer ſpaniel take, / Teach him to range the ditch, and force the brake; […]
ref: 1713, John Gay, “Rural Sports. A Georgic. Inscribed to Mr. [Alexander] Pope.”, in Poems on Several Occasions, volume I, London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], and Bernard Lintot, […], published 1720, →OCLC, page 21, lines 345–346:
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glosses: To rove over or through.
examples: text: The soule is variable in all manner of formes, and rangeth to her selfe, and to her estate, whatsoever it be, the senses of the body, and all other accidents.
ref: 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 40, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book I, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:
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glosses: To exercise the power of something over something else; to cause to submit to, over.
examples: text: At last we gained such an offing, that the two pilots were needed no longer. The stout sail-boat that had accompanied us began ranging alongside.
ref: 1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “chapter 22”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC:
text: In ranging herself as a partisan on the side of Major Pallaby Mrs. Hoopington had been largely influenced by the fact that she had made up her mind to marry him at an early date.
ref: 1910, Saki [pseudonym; Hector Hugh Munro], “The Bag”, in Reginald in Russia and Other Sketches, London: Methuen & Co. […], →OCLC, page 76:
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glosses: To bring (something) into a specified position or relationship (especially, of opposition) with something else.
examples: text: The variable x ranges over all real values from 0 to 10.
text: The police seized 12,000 files containing information on a wide range of organisations and individuals. The ADL claimed to be only monitoring ‘hate groups’, and denied passing information to Israel or South Africa. But the files ranged over Arab-American community organisations, trade unions, the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People, Anti-Apartheid, Women in Black and the International Jewish Peace Union. Only a relative handful of files dealt with the far right.
ref: 2002, Charlie Pottins, “How ADL got caught in Apartheid spy case”, in Jewish Socialist, number 46:
text: In the past two years, NASA’s Kepler Space Telescope has located nearly 3,000 exoplanet candidates ranging from sub-Earth-sized minions to gas giants that dwarf our own Jupiter. Their densities range from that of styrofoam to iron.
ref: 2013 May-June, Kevin Heng, “Why Does Nature Form Exoplanets Easily?”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 3, page 184:
text: The 2025 timetable would feature two trains per hour, alternately routed via Kirkcaldy (with 11 intermediate stops) and Dunfermline (14 stops), with journey times ranging between 65 and 81 minutes.
ref: 2023 November 1, Robert Drysdale, “Leven is nearly back on track...”, in RAIL, number 995, page 58:
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synonyms: run
glosses: Of a variable, to be able to take any of the values in a specified range.
examples: text: to range plants and animals in genera and species
text: The coins are ranged into nine classes.
ref: 1785, William Coxe, Travels Into Poland, Russia, Sweden, and Denmark, page 129:
text: All requirements could be ranged into the classes.
ref: 2013, Hubert Kals, Fred van Houten, Integration of Process Knowledge into Design Support, page 378:
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glosses: To classify.
examples: text: The front of a house ranges with the street.
text: The street-lamps burn amid the baleful glooms, / Amidst the soundless solitudes immense / Of ranged mansions dark and still as tombs.
ref: 1873, James Thomson (B.V.), The City of Dreadful Night:
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glosses: To form a line or a row.
examples: text: And range with humble livers in content.
ref: 1613 (date written), William Shakespeare, [John Fletcher], “The Famous History of the Life of King Henry the Eight”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iii]:
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glosses: To be placed in order; to be ranked; to admit of arrangement or classification; to rank.
examples: text: Maccabeus ranged his army by hands.
ref: 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Bible Maccabees/#12 2 Maccabees:12–20:
text: Were this dependence of the body and mind more studied, and its effects collected and ranged into proper order; no doubt, we would be able to form a better judgment of it, and see further into the good purposes to which it serves;
ref: 1740, George Turnbull, The Principles of Moral Philosophy, page 77:
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glosses: To set in a row, or in rows; to place in a regular line or lines, or in ranks; to dispose in the proper order.
examples: text: It would be absurd in me to range myself on the side of the Duke of Bedford and the corresponding society.
ref: 1796, Edmund Burke, A Letter from the Right Honourable Edmund Burke to a Noble Lord, on the Attacks Made upon Him and His Pension, […], London: […] J. Owen, […], and F[rancis] and C[harles] Rivington, […], →OCLC:
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glosses: To place among others in a line, row, or order, as in the ranks of an army; usually, reflexively and figuratively, to espouse a cause, to join a party, etc.
examples: text: The peba ranges from Texas to Paraguay.
topics: biology
natural-sciences
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glosses: To be native to, or live in, a certain district or region.
topics: government
military
politics
war
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glosses: To determine the range to a target.
raw_tags: of artillery
examples: text: to range the coast
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glosses: To sail or pass in a direction parallel to or near.
examples: text: Willie, playing in left-center, raced toward a ball no human had any business getting a glove to. Mays ranged to his left, searching, digging in, pouring on the speed, as the crowd screamed its anticipation of a triple.
ref: 2009, Jason Aronoff, Going, Going ... Caught!: Baseball's Great Outfield Catches as Described by Those Who Saw Them, 1887-1964, →ISBN, page 250:
topics: ball-games
baseball
games
hobbies
lifestyle
sports
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glosses: Of a player, to travel a significant distance for a defensive play.
Derived terms: broad-ranging
wide-ranging