[app. a frequentative of the stem found in Du. and LG. spatten to burst, spout, etc.: cf. WFris. spatterje, Helgoland spattere to spirt, WFlem. spetteren to spatter.]
I. trans. 1. To scatter or disperse in fragments.
1582. Stanyhurst, Æneis, II. (Arb.), 44. But Capys … Did wish thee woodden monster weare drowned,… or ribs too spatter a sunder.
1658. Bromhall, Treat. Specters, II. 175. [He] did command … to burn all, and to spatter the ruines all about.
1877. Tennyson, Harold, II. ii. O God, that I were in some wide, waste field With nothing but my battle-axe and him To spatter his brains!
b. With out: To sputter, or cause to sputter.
a. 1586. Sidney, Arcadia, IV. (1598), 396. He without any regard of reseruing it for the Kings knowledge, spattered out the bottome of his stomacke.
1649. G. Daniel, Trinarch., Hen. V., xxv. But now the Palsey of the Common Earth Trembles my Quill, and Spatters out my Inke.
1806. H. Siddons, Maid, Wife, & Widow, III. 76. The indiscriminate censure which every pert would-be witling spatters out against the practice of the law.
c. To dash, cast, send flying, in drops or small particles. Const. with preps. or advs.
1721. Bailey, Spatter, to dash or sprinkle upon.
1841. Catlin, N. Amer. Ind., lii. (1844), II. 141. Several others struck so near on each side as to spatter the water into our faces.
1852. Hawthorne, Blithedale Rom., v. The … puffs of wind spattered the snow against the windows.
1889. F. C. Beach, in Anthony’s Photogr. Bull., II. 308. The person working at the next sink cannot spatter hypo or other chemicals on his neighbor’s plate.
1905. [see 7].
2. To splash or stain with drops of fluid, mud, etc.; to bespatter; fig. to assail with obloquy or detraction.
1645. Wither, Vox Pacifica, 65. Your Foes … Finde meanes to spatter, and to ruine those, Whom, to defend, you did (with vowes) professe.
1656. Ld. Hatton, in Nicholas Papers (Camden), III. 284. Mr Smith is uery sencible that many little pens will spatter him.
1718. Lady M. W. Montagu, Lett. to C’tess Mar, 28 Aug. The arms of France over the house of the envoy [were] spattered with dung in the night.
1727. Gay, Fables, I. xiv. 45. Bend all your force to spatter merit.
1879. Froude, Cæsar, xviii. 296. As an advocate, he must praise the man whom, a year before, he had spattered with ignominy.
1900. Eliz. L. Banks, in 19th Cent., XLVIII. 795. They’re actually kicking in that mud-puddle there and trying to spatter your nice white dress.
b. To cover in a dispersed manner.
1647. H. More, Cupid’s Conf., xlii. So Natures carelesse pencill dipt in light With sprinkled starres hath spattered the Night.
1841. Dickens, Barn. Rudge, lxv. Lighted brands came whirling down, spattering the ground with fire.
1864. Lowell, Fireside Trav., 240. The walls were spattered with placards.
3. Of fluids, etc.: To fall or strike upon (something) in scattered drops.
1837. Carlyle, Fr. Rev., III. I. vi. He dies…; his blood spattering the cheeks of his old Mother.
1860. Gosse, Rom. Nat. Hist., 42. Huge drops of warm rain, like blood-drops, are spattering the stones.
II. intr. 4. To spring or fly, to spirt, in drops or particles; to throw off drops or small fragments.
1600. Surflet, Countrie Farme, III. liii. 553. As it is boiling … it will be spattering and casting vp bubbles. Ibid. If it spatter, there is yet some waterish moisture remaining in it.
1674. Ray, Coll. Wds., Iron Work, 129. If … you cast upon the Iron a piece of Brass it will hinder the metal from working, causing it to spatter about.
1863. Tyndall, Heat, ii. 38. The liquid metal is seen spattering over the poles of the magnet.
1883. T. M. Coan, in Harper’s Mag., June, 117/2. The mineral ichor rises and dances in clouds of steam; it fumes, it spouts, it spatters.
b. To fall, descend, strike, in heavy drops or with a sound suggestive of these.
1675. Hannah Woolley, Gentlew. Comp., 145. Pour your Eggs and Cream very high into the Bason, that it may spatter in it.
1859. Hawthorne, Fr. & It. Note-bks., II. 279. The rain-drops began to spatter down faster.
1869. Tozer, Highl. Turkey, I. 316. We heard their bullets … spatter against the rocks.
1887. Besant, The World went, v. The musket-balls spattering in the water.
5. To eject small drops of saliva or particles of food, etc., from the mouth; to splutter while speaking; to cause spattering in any way.
1618. Breton, Courtier & Countryman, Wks. (Grosart), II. 14/1. The Seruants … no sooner tasted of it, but they did so spit and spatter as if they had been poysoned.
1649. Milton, Eikon., 19. That mind must needs be irrecoverably deprav’d, which … tasting but once of one just deed, spatters at it, and abhorrs the relish ever after.
c. 1645. Howell, Lett., I. 229. The Grave spatter’d and shook his Head, saying, ’Twas the greatest error he had committed since he knew what belonged to a Soldier.
1828. Lytton, Pelham, I. xxxv. 303–4. The confused hubbub of the little domestic deities, who eat, clattered, spattered, and squabbled around her.
b. To scatter drops of ink.
a. 1640. Jackson, Creed, XI. xlii. Wks. XI. 258. As children often make fair letters while their tutors guide their hands, but spatter and blot and dash after they be left to their own guidance.
6. To walk or tread in some splashy substance.
1806. Bloomfield, Wild Flowers, 9. The mill-brook…, Good creature! how he’d spatter through!
1897. ‘O. Rhoscomyl,’ White Rose Arno, 186. ‘Well, I must find out where I stand first,’ said he to himself as he spattered along in the darkness.
III. 7. In combs., as spatter-cone, -dock (see quots.); spatter-work, a method of producing decorative work by spraying ink or other fluid over something (e.g., leaves of plants) laid on paper or other suitable material.
1856. A. Gray, Man. Bot. (1860), 23. Nuphar.… Yellow Pond-Lily. Spatter-dock.
1873. Eliz. Phelps, Trotty’s Wedding Tour, 224. We had re-covered the pin-cushion too, with gray spatter-work (oak leaves and acorns) on cranberry silk.
1891. Kipling & Balestier, Naulahka (1892), 21. His collection of Baptist dolls, Presbyterian embroidery, and Roman Catholic sofa-pillows and spatter-work, filled his parlour at home.
1905. Chamberlin & Salisbury, Geol., I. 580. A still more subordinate variety consists of ‘spatter-cones’ formed by small mildly explosive vents that spatter forth little dabs of lava which form chimneys, or cones.
Hence Spatteration, spattering. U.S.
1853. Mrs. Moodie, Life in Clearings, 112. I wonder if … this waterfall [has] been underminin’ With constant spatteration.
1902. Westm. Gaz., 23 June, 2/1. For Londoners there is no alternative between spatteration and suffocation.
