spoor
noun · verb
Simple meaning
The track, trail, droppings, or scent of an animal.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
spuurIPA pronunciation (US)
ˈspʊɹ
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
The track, trail, droppings, or scent of an animal.
The trail left by a person or an animal; what the hunter follows in pursuing game
“The hounds followed the fox's spoor.”
An occupational surname from Middle English
verb
transitive
To track (an animal) by following its spoor.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C2 · Proficient (estimated)
- Frequency
- Rare
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: The track, trail, droppings, or scent of an animal.
Used this way, spoor is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Matter-of-fact
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use spoor
- “The hounds followed the fox's spoor.”noun
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.