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Webster's Dictionary (1865)

4 entries under this word

Trace

Trāçe, n.

noun

n. [Fr. trace, Pr. trassa, Sp. traza, It. traccia. See TRACE, v. t.]

  1. A mark left by any thing passing; a footprint; a track; a vestige; as, the trace of a carriage or sled; the trace of a man or of a deer.
  2. A mark, impression, or visible appearance of any thing left when the thing itself no longer exists; remains; token; vestige.

The shady empire shall retain no trace Of war or blood, but in the sylvan chase. Pope. 3. (Descriptive Geom. & Persp.) The intersection of a plane of projection, or an original plane, with a co-ordinate plane. Syn. — Vestige; mark; token. See VESTIGE.

Trāçe, n.

noun

n. [O. Fr. trace, a kind of cord. See supra and infra.] One of the two straps, chains, or ropes, by which a carriage or sleigh is drawn by horses.

Trāçe, v. t.

verbtransitive

v. t. [imp. & p. p. TRACED (trāst); p. pr. & vb. n. TRACING.] [Fr. tracer, O. Fr. tracier, trasser, tracker, tressier, Sp. trazar, It. tracci-ure, Lat. as if tractiare, from tractus, p. p. of trahere, to draw.]

Sense 1. To walk over; to pass through.

We do trace this alley up and down. Shak.

Sense 2. To mark out; to draw or delineate with marks; especially, to copy, as a drawing or engraving, by following the lines and marking them on a sheet superimposed, through which they appear; as, to trace a figure with a pencil; to trace the outline of any thing; a traced drawing.

Sense 3. To follow by some mark that has been left by a person or thing which has preceded; to follow by footsteps or tracks.

You may trace the deluge quite round the globe. Burnet.

I feel thy power to trace the ways Of highest agents. Milton.

Sense 4. Hence, to follow the trace or track of. “All the way the prince our footpace traced.” Spenser.

Sense 5. To follow with exactness.

That servile path thou nobly dost decline, Of tracing word by word, and line by line. Denham.

Trāçe, v. i.

verbintransitive

To walk; to go; to travel. [Obs.]