Sunday Word: Perambulate

[sallymn.livejournal.com]

perambulate [per-am-byuh-leyt]

verb:
1 walk or travel through or round a place or area, especially for pleasure and in a leisurely way.
1a (historic British) walk round (a parish, forest, etc.) in order to officially assert and record its boundaries.

Examples:

Built over two years by engineer Thomas Cargill, it reached over 1,000 feet into the sea and featured an impressive castellated entrance. Visitors paid a penny a head to perambulate over the beach, the waves and way out across the sea. (Dave Lee, Why unique Withernsea stands apart from its Yorkshire coast counterparts, Yorkshire Post, August 2020)

"We can sometimes spot them at night when we perambulate the forest," the official added. (Keerthi P, Rare sighting of slender lorises in Tirumala amid COVID-19 lockdown, The News Minute, May 2020)

It happened more than once that they would thus perambulate three or four times the distance, each seeing the other on board his ship out of pure and disinterested affection. (Joseph Conrad, The Mirror of the Sea)

If the gentleman wishes to perambulate America, it is probable he will get there with a little patience. (H+James Fenimore Cooper, Homeward Bound)

Origin:

Late Middle English from Latin perambulat- 'walked about', from the verb perambulare, from per- 'all over' + ambulare 'to walk'. (Oxford English Dictionary)

"walk through, about, or over," 1560s, from Latin perambulatus, past participle of perambulare "to walk through, go through, ramble through," from per "through" (from PIE root per- (1) "forward," hence "through") + ambulare "to walk, go about". (Online Etymology Dictionary)