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What is "grope"

Crossword clues for grope

grope
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
grope
I.verb
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADVERB
along
▪ The smell of stale beer and cigarette smoke spilled into the back-stage corridors as we groped along in search of my dressing room.
around
▪ As a newcomer to a job and organisation, you may find yourself groping around to discover how status operates.
▪ She set Janir down in the garden where he groped around and tested the dirt with his mouth.
▪ His hand groped around the wall just inside the door, feeling for the light switch.
▪ We groped around in the darkness, found a fat tallow candle and I lit it with my tinder.
▪ I groped around with my foot for the table-leg and pressed down hard until the spasm gradually subsided.
▪ She began to struggle free of Marco's embrace, groping around for anchorage.
▪ Frankie groped around on the shelves until his fingers encountered a deep plate.
▪ Lucker gropes around on the floor.
■ NOUN
hand
▪ His hand groped around the wall just inside the door, feeling for the light switch.
▪ Holding my throbbing temples between my hands, I groped my way to the Oval.
▪ The mummy clawed blindly with his free hand, groping for the chip man's voice.
▪ She turned wildly, then staggered, her hands groping for the brass footrail of the bed.
▪ With her other hand she groped and found the switch.
▪ Tolby flung himself sideways, his hand groping for the door handle.
▪ The other man moved over to join them, gripping Connelly's right arm so that his hand was groping at empty air.
PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
push/grope/inch etc your way somewhere
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ Fumbling and vague groping is encouraged.
▪ He was merely groping for the road to freedom.
▪ I groped a few more feet into the bush.
▪ Mr. Kinnock I think the answer that the Prime Minister was groping for was yes.
▪ She set Janir down in the garden where he groped around and tested the dirt with his mouth.
▪ Sometimes, but only very rarely do I touch a piece of bliss when I grope in the dark.
▪ Then she groped at her shoulder to where the oxygen tank was moulded around her triceps.
II.noun
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ Berkoff portrays a lonely middle-aged woman who has had more than her fair share of gropes in corners and one-night stands.
▪ But this was a dark place of gropes and whispers, of black silhouettes.
▪ Unable to see out the operator inside was responsible for a few unintentional gropes during rehearsals!
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Grope

Grope \Grope\, v. t.

  1. To search out by feeling in the dark; as, we groped our way at midnight.

  2. To examine; to test; to sound. [Obs.]
    --Chaucer.

    Felix gropeth him, thinking to have a bribe.
    --Genevan Test. (Acts xxiv. ).

Grope

Grope \Grope\ (gr[=o]p), v. i. [imp. & p. p. Groped (gr[=o]pt); p. pr. & vb. n. Groping.] [OE. gropen, gropien, grapien, AS. gr[=a]pian to touch, grope, fr. gr[imac]pan to gripe. See Gripe.]

  1. To feel with or use the hands; to handle. [Obs.]

  2. To search or attempt to find something in the dark, or, as a blind person, by feeling; to move about hesitatingly, as in darkness or obscurity; to feel one's way, as with the hands, when one can not see.

    We grope for the wall like the blind.
    --Is. lix. 10.

    To grope a little longer among the miseries and sensualities ot a worldly life.
    --Buckminster.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
grope

Old English grapian "to feel about (as one blind or in darkness)," originally "lay hold of, seize, touch, attain," related to gripan "grasp at" (see gripe). Figurative sense is from early 14c. Indecent sense (marked as "obsolete" in OED) is from c.1200. Related: Groped; groping. The noun is Old English grap.

Wiktionary
grope

n. 1 (context informal English) An act of groping, especially sexually. 2 (context obsolete English) an iron fitting of a medieval cart wheel vb. 1 (lb en obsolete) To feel with or use the hands; to handle. 2 To search or attempt to find something in the dark, or, as a blind person, by feeling; to move about hesitatingly, as in darkness or obscurity; to feel one's way, as with the hands, when one can not see. 3 To touch (another person) closely and (especially) sexually. 4 (lb en obsolete) To examine; to test; to sound.

WordNet
grope

  1. n. the act of groping; and instance of groping

  2. v. feel about uncertainly or blindly; "She groped for her glasses in the darkness of the bedroom" [syn: fumble]

  3. search blindly or uncertainly; "His mind groped to make the connection"

  4. fondle for sexual pleasure; "He made some sexual advances at the woman in his office and groped her repeatedly"

Related phrases:

Usage examples of "grope".

We took it all in as we played chase, until we stopped near another door to grope and kiss before heading back out into the public areas, giggling and grinning as we did so.

Dirk raised his fists, groping, could scarcely hold them up, the cestas suddenly unbearably heavy.

When they had finished their bowls to the last drop, Chiao Tai rose and groped in his sleeve.

He groped for the steel lip and tentatively snaked both hands inside until they collided with the topmost mound of cinerous residue.

Steve moaned his citified inadequacy while he groped in the dark cave, trying to make his brain remember where the packsack was.

And the lawyer, scared by the thought, brooded awhile on his own past, groping in all the corners of memory, least by chance some Jack-in-the-Box of an old iniquity should leap to light there.

Jerry Cruncher eyed the Lieutenant with something very much like disgust and he groped his pipe from his pocket.

While inimical stares from the councilmen sharpened around the table, and the Mayor of Isaer whispered something to a servant that brought guardsmen in full mail to block the doorway, Lord Diegan groped to draw the hidden dagger in his sleeve.

He stretched out one hand, groping in the gray gloom, and found the drawcord of the drapes.

Then he reached forward, groped blindly into the fresh earthfall, and at last felt the timer.

And the phylum Echinodermata she left far behind, left the starfishes, the sea urchins, and their allies to grope in peace in the dark water of the sea.

He had groped for firedogs in the hearth, thinking he might use them to break down the door, but the fireplace was empty.

He had struck Gaz again heavily, and when he reached down again to grope for his weapon his hand contacted it immediately, as though someone had placed it in his grasp.

It was worms, she thought: they burst through the curtain of filthy rags that covered the squirming globby flesh, huge as serpents, their round reddish heads groping blind.

He grinned back crookedly, feeling the woman-generated guilt spreading all through him like the slow groping tentacles of a fungus.