tramped; tramping; tramps
1
: to walk, tread, or step especially heavily
tramped loudly on the stairs
2
a
: to travel about on foot : hike
b
: to journey as a tramp
1
: to tread on forcibly and repeatedly
2
: to travel or wander through or over on foot
have tramped all the woods on their property
tramper
noun
plural tramps
1
a
b
: a person who travels on foot
2
a
disparaging
: a woman who has multiple sexual partners : a woman who is promiscuous
b
disparaging
: a woman who engages in sex acts and especially sexual intercourse in exchange for pay : a woman who is a sex worker
3
: a walking trip : hike
4
: the succession of sounds made by the beating of feet on a surface (such as a road, pavement, or floor)
5
: an iron plate to protect the sole of a shoe
6
: a ship not making regular trips but taking cargo when and where it offers and to any port
called also tramp steamer
Examples of tramp in a Sentence
Verb
We spent the day tramping through the woods.
He tramped the streets looking for his dog.
Noun
a tramp through the woods
the police encouraged the tramps who were sleeping in the park to spend the bitterly cold night in the homeless shelter
Recent Examples on the Web
Cory Turner, NPR, 10 Oct. 2025
Thousands upon thousands of people tramped through Paris in 2015, grieving the 11 journalists and one police officer killed in the attack on Charlie Hebdo and promising to safeguard its mission.
—Joseph Ataman, CNN Money, 27 Sep. 2025
JSTOR Daily, 21 Oct. 2025
Help, of course, isn’t coming—not over the Indian Ocean, not in the nursing home, not on the tramps’ moonlit road.
—Helen Shaw, New Yorker, 2 Oct. 2025
Elizabeth Logan, Glamour, 22 Mar. 2023
Docks depended on a circulating pool of male maritime workers—crews of seamen and stokers who manned the tramp steamers, gangs of longshoremen, and stevedores who loaded and unloaded goods, as well as artisans and machinists who maintained and repaired the ships and trains.
—Michael Denning, Foreign Affairs, 21 Aug. 2015
See All Example Sentences for tramp
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Verb
The students tramp upstairs to a room of artifacts owned by a Black family in the 1860s.
—Cory Turner, NPR, 10 Oct. 2025
Thousands upon thousands of people tramped through Paris in 2015, grieving the 11 journalists and one police officer killed in the attack on Charlie Hebdo and promising to safeguard its mission.
—Joseph Ataman, CNN Money, 27 Sep. 2025
Noun
As historian Kelly Lytle Hernández writes, one thing that stood in the way of this vision was the figure of the tramp.
—JSTOR Daily, 21 Oct. 2025
Help, of course, isn’t coming—not over the Indian Ocean, not in the nursing home, not on the tramps’ moonlit road.
—Helen Shaw, New Yorker, 2 Oct. 2025
Adjective
Probably not another tramp stamp but who knows.
—Elizabeth Logan, Glamour, 22 Mar. 2023
Docks depended on a circulating pool of male maritime workers—crews of seamen and stokers who manned the tramp steamers, gangs of longshoremen, and stevedores who loaded and unloaded goods, as well as artisans and machinists who maintained and repaired the ships and trains.
—Michael Denning, Foreign Affairs, 21 Aug. 2015
See All Example Sentences for tramp
Cite this Entry
“Tramp.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/tramp. Accessed 3 Nov. 2025.
Copy CitationKids Definition
tramp
1 of 2 verb
ˈtramp 
senses 1 & 2 are also ˈträmp,
ˈtrȯmp
1
: to walk heavily
2
: to tread on forcibly and repeatedly
3
: to travel or wander through on foot
tramp the streets
tramper
noun
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