Pronunciations (3)
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/spɔːn/
Pronunciation notes
- Received-Pronunciation
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/spɔn/
Pronunciation notes
- General-American
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/spɑn/
Pronunciation notes
- cot-caught-merger
Verb
To produce or deposit (eggs) in water.
Usage- Transitive
- Examples
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A frog spawns thousands of tadpoles every year.
To generate, bring into being, especially nonmammalian beings in very large numbers.
Usage- Transitive
To bring forth in general.
Usage- Transitive
- Examples
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The web server spawns a new process to handle each client's request.
More examples (1)
Weather Underground, a covert organization that spawned countless other would-be revolutionary cadres - the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA), the Black Liberation Army, the May 19 Communist Organization each of which
To induce (aquatic organisms) to spawn.
Usage- Transitive
To plant with fungal spawn.
Usage- Transitive
To deposit (numerous) eggs in water.
Usage- Intransitive
- Examples
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Alewives are anadromous fish: Born in freshwater, they spend their lives in the ocean, returning annually to their birthplaces to spawn.
To reproduce, especially in large numbers.
Usage- Intransitive
To appear, or cause (something or someone) to appear, spontaneously in a game world at a particular place and time.
Usage- ergative
- Narrower terms
- Examples
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We put down torches to stop creepers from spawning.
To appear, or cause (something or someone) to appear, unexpectedly and seemingly out of nowhere.
Usage- Internet
- ergative
- Figurative
- Examples
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Where did he come from? Bro just spawned in.
Mavs fans really be spawning out of nowhere.
More examples (6)
So many virgos have spawned in my life lately
I swear a new vtuber with 250,000 subscribers and wildly transphobic views just spawns every other fucking week
rizz so strong the bf just spawned out of nowhere
bro jus spawns in when the word cuck is mentioned
God spawning in a new streamer and fans for him every week:
McDonalds skips the whole process and just spawns a new building somewhere
Of a person or non-egglaying animal: to be born.
Usage- Internet
- Figurative
- Humorous
- Intransitive
- Examples
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That kid just spawned and looks like he's already done with life.
I spawned in Turkey. I wasn't given an option on difficulty. It was automatically set on the hardest.
More examples (2)
Oh he is entirely too smol! Just spawned and already running a drug ring!! ❤️
dude literally just spawned and already gave up
Noun
The numerous eggs of an aquatic organism.
Usage- Countable
- Uncountable
Mushroom mycelium prepared for (aided) propagation.
Usage- Countable
- Uncountable
Any germ or seed, even a figurative source.
Usage- Countable
- Uncountable
- Examples
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This dreadful idea is the spawn of a large business conglomerate.
Any germ or seed, even a figurative source. Children; offspring.
Usage- Countable
- Derogatory
- often
- Uncountable
- Examples
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More examples (1)
Even the blithely unselfconscious Homer is more than a little freaked out by West’s private reverie, and encourages his spawn to move slowly away without making eye contact with the crazy man.
The buds or branches produced from underground stems.
Usage- Countable
- Uncountable
Synonym of spawn point.
Usage- Countable
- Uncountable
Noun
the mass of eggs deposited by fish or amphibians or molluscs
- Broader terms
Verb
call forth
lay spawn
- Broader terms
- Examples
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The salmon swims upstream to spawn