[1] : The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48

rove \rove\, v. i. imp.  p. p. roved; p. pr.  vb. n.
   roving. cf. d. rooven to rob; akin to e. reave. see
   reave, rob.
   1. to practice robbery on the seas; to wander about on the
      seas in piracy. obs. --hakluyt.
      1913 webster

   2. hence, to wander; to ramble; to rauge; to go, move, or
      pass without certain direction in any manner, by sailing,
      walking, riding, flying, or otherwise.
      1913 webster

            for who has power to walk has power to rove.
                                                  --arbuthnot.
      1913 webster

   3. archery to shoot at rovers; hence, to shoot at an angle
      of elevation, not at point-blank rovers usually being
      beyond the point-blank range.
      1913 webster

            fair venus' son, that with thy cruel dart
            at that good knight so cunningly didst rove.
                                                  --spenser.
      1913 webster

   syn: to wander; roam; range; ramble stroll.
        1913 webster
see also:
roved roving reave rob 

[2] : The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48

roving \rov"ing\, n.
   1. the operatin of forming the rove, or slightly twisted
      sliver or roll of wool or cotton, by means of a machine
      for the purpose, called a roving frame, or roving machine.
      1913 webster

   2. a roll or sliver of wool or cotton drawn out and slightly
      twisted; a rove. see 2d rove, 2.
      1913 webster

   roving frame, roving machine, a machine for drawing and
      twisting roves and twisting roves and winding them on
      bobbin for the spinning machine.
      1913 webster
see also:
rove roving frame roving machine 

[3] : The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48

roving \rov"ing\, n.
   the act of one who roves or wanders.
   1913 webster

[4] : WordNet (r) 2.0

roving
     adj : of groups of people tending to travel and change
           settlements frequently; "a restless mobile society";
           "the nomadic habits of the bedouins"; "believed the
           profession of a peregrine typist would have a happy
           future"; "wandering tribes" syn: mobile, nomadic,
           peregrine, wandering
     n : travelling about without any clear destination; "she
         followed him in his wanderings and looked after him"
         syn: wandering, vagabondage
see also:
mobile nomadic peregrine wandering vagabondage 

[5] : Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0

156 moby thesaurus words for "roving":
   wanderjahr, aberrant, aberrative, adrift, afloat,
   afoot and lighthearted, aimless, aimlessness, alternating,
   amorphous, bumming, by the way, capricious, changeable, changeful,
   circuitous, circumforaneous, departing, desultoriness, desultory,
   deviable, deviant, deviating, deviative, deviatory, devious,
   digressive, digressiveness, discursion, discursive, discursiveness,
   divagation, divagatory, dizzy, drifting, eccentric, episodic,
   errant, errantry, erratic, excursive, fast and loose, fickle,
   fitful, flickering, flighty, flitting, floating, fluctuating,
   footloose, footloose and fancy-free, freakish, fugitive, gadding,
   giddy, gypsy-like, gypsyish, hoboism, impetuous, impulsive,
   inconsistent, inconstant, indecisive, indirect, infirm, irregular,
   irresolute, irresponsible, itineracy, itinerancy, labyrinthine,
   landloping, loose, maundering, mazy, meandering, mercurial,
   migrational, migratory, moody, nomad, nomadic, nomadism,
   out-of-the-way, perambulatory, peregrination, pererration,
   peripatetic, planetary, ramble, rambling, ranging, restless, roam,
   roaming, rove, scatterbrained, serpentine, shapeless, shifting,
   shifty, shuffling, snaky, spasmodic, spineless, straggling, stray,
   straying, strolling, swerving, traipsing, transient, transitory,
   transmigratory, turning, twisting, unaccountable, uncertain,
   uncontrolled, undependable, undirected, undisciplined, unfixed,
   unpredictable, unreliable, unrestrained, unsettled, unstable,
   unstable as water, unstaid, unsteadfast, unsteady, vacillating,
   vagabond, vagabondage, vagabondia, vagabondism, vagrancy, vagrant,
   variable, veering, vicissitudinary, vicissitudinous, volatile,
   wandering, wanderlust, wanton, wavering, wavery, wavy, wayfaring,
   wayward, whimsical, winding, wishy-washy, zigzag

Roving >> R Words
Roving, definition of term: Roving
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