[syn: digress, stray, divagate, wander]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Wander \Wan"der\, v. t.
To travel over without a certain course; to traverse; to
stroll through. [R.] "[Elijah] wandered this barren waste."
--Milton.
[1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Wander \Wan"der\, v. i. [imp. & p. p. Wandered; p. pr. & vb.
n. Wandering.] [OE. wandren, wandrien, AS. wandrian; akin
to G. wandern to wander; fr. AS. windan to turn. See Wind
to turn.]
[1913 Webster]
1. To ramble here and there without any certain course or
with no definite object in view; to range about; to
stroll; to rove; as, to wander over the fields.
[1913 Webster]
They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins.
--Heb. xi. 37.
[1913 Webster]
He wandereth abroad for bread. --Job xv. 23.
[1913 Webster]
2. To go away; to depart; to stray off; to deviate; to go
astray; as, a writer wanders from his subject.
[1913 Webster]
When God caused me to wander from my father's house.
--Gen. xx. 13.
[1913 Webster]
O, let me not wander from thy commandments. --Ps.
cxix. 10.
[1913 Webster]
3. To be delirious; not to be under the guidance of reason;
to rave; as, the mind wanders.
[1913 Webster]
Syn: To roam; rove; range; stroll; gad; stray; straggly; err;
swerve; deviate; depart.
[1913 Webster]
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):
wander
v 1: move about aimlessly or without any destination, often in
search of food or employment; "The gypsies roamed the
woods"; "roving vagabonds"; "the wandering Jew"; "The
cattle roam across the prairie"; "the laborers drift from
one town to the next"; "They rolled from town to town"
[syn: roll, wander, swan, stray, tramp, roam,
cast, ramble, rove, range, drift, vagabond]
2: be sexually unfaithful to one's partner in marriage; "She
cheats on her husband"; "Might her husband be wandering?"
[syn: cheat on, cheat, cuckold, betray, wander]
3: go via an indirect route or at no set pace; "After dinner, we
wandered into town"
4: to move or cause to move in a sinuous, spiral, or circular
course; "the river winds through the hills"; "the path
meanders through the vineyards"; "sometimes, the gout wanders
through the entire body" [syn: weave, wind, thread,
meander, wander]
5: lose clarity or turn aside especially from the main subject
of attention or course of argument in writing, thinking, or
speaking; "She always digresses when telling a story"; "her
mind wanders"; "Don't digress when you give a lecture" [syn:
digress, stray, divagate, wander]
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:
97 Moby Thesaurus words for "wander":
amble, babble, bat, bat around, be absent, be in error, be insane,
be mistaken, be wrong, boom, bum, circumambulate, count ties,
daydream, depart, deviate, digress, divagate, diverge, dote, dream,
drift, drivel, drool, err, excurse, fall into error, fantasy, flit,
gad, gad about, gallivant, get sidetracked, go about, go adrift,
go amiss, go astray, go awry, go the rounds, go woolgathering,
go wrong, have a demon, hit the road, hit the trail, hobo, jaunt,
knock about, knock around, lapse, maunder, meander, misbelieve,
miscalculate, mooch, moon, muse, nomadize, peregrinate, pererrate,
pipe-dream, project, prowl, rage, ramble, range, rant, rave, roam,
roll, rove, run about, run amok, run mad, saunter, serve Mammon,
slaver, slip, slip up, slobber, snake, stargaze, straggle, stray,
stroll, stumble, trail, traipse, tramp, trip, turn aside, twist,
twist and turn, vagabond, vagabondize, walk the tracks, wayfare,
wind