Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Spawn

Spawn (spa̤n), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Spawned; p. pr. & vb. n. Spawning.] [OE. spanen, OF. espandre, properly, to shed, spread, L. expandere to spread out. See Expand.] 1. To produce or deposit (eggs), as fishes or frogs do.

2. To bring forth; to generate; — used in contempt.

One edition [of books] spawneth another. Fuller.

Spawn, v. i. 1. To deposit eggs, as fish or frogs do.

2. To issue, as offspring; — used contemptuously.

Spawn, n. [√170. See Spawn, v. t.] 1. The ova, or eggs, of fishes, oysters, and other aquatic animals.

2. Any product or offspring; — used contemptuously.

3. (Hort.) The buds or branches produced from underground stems.

4. (Bot.) The white fibrous matter forming the matrix from which fungi.

Spawn eater (Zoöl.), a small American cyprinoid fish (Notropis Hudsonius) allied to the dace.

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty. Of the others, 1,362 (a word or a single letter each) were inferred by AI from the context by the dictionary’s own rules and are marked with a wavy underline (tap or point at one to see the note); the rest, which could not be inferred with confidence, are left as “?”.