Talk:cluster

RFV discussion: April 2023–December 2024

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cluster

Rfv-sense "To cover (something) or provide with clusters of things.", "To cover or provide with clusters of things." Apparently added by @Sgconlaw by editing an older "To cover with clusters", by itself a bit ambiguous, but nothing compared to this, where I have absolutely no idea where this would be used. — SURJECTION ^{/ T / C / L /} 06:00, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

OED has both these senses. The intransitive sense only has one cite: "clustering with all variety of verdure". The intransitive sense, likewise, is typically attested as "clustered with" - searching Google Books for older texts seems to turn up a few likely cites? This, that and the other (talk) 07:54, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure any of those match the definition I gave (especially the "cover" part) - maybe they could work for "to furnish or decorate with clusters of things"? — SURJECTION ^{/ T / C / L /} 08:48, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm withdrawing this for the transitive sense anyway in favor of rewording it - the 'intransitive sense' you mentioned is however not intransitive. "to be clustered with" is passive use of the transitive verb, not a use of the intransitive one. "be clustering with" would count, though... — SURJECTION ^{/ T / C / L /} 10:32, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

@This, that and the other has mostly replied, but I should just point out that the sole quotation in OED indicating the intransitive sense "To cover or provide with clusters of things" was "Stupendous crags, clustering with all variety of verdure" rather than a construction with "be clustering with", so that does appear to be intransitive rather than transitive. — Sgconlaw (talk) 15:45, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

This was untagged a year ago, but sense 1.2 "To cover (with clusters); to scatter or strew in clusters (within); to distribute (objects) within such that they form clusters." has only a single usex and I am not sure whether it's correctly assigned; I have raised the grammar question in the TR. At this point I'll just leave this RFV open until the grammar/TR question is resolved. - -sche (discuss) 16:48, 14 December 2024 (UTC)

Alright, I can find (and added to the citations page) other cites of that form, and the Tea Room thinks the grammar's fine, so I'm striking this as resolved; it was untagged long ago. - -sche (discuss) 18:10, 15 December 2024 (UTC)