Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To plunge into or through water.
  • noun One who or that which squats.
  • noun One who settles on new land, particularly on public land, without a title.
  • noun Hence One who or that which assumes domiciliary rights without a title.
  • noun One who obtains from the government a right of pasturage on moderate terms; also, any stock-owner.
  • noun In ornithology, same as krieker.
  • To make a noise like a flock of wild fowl flapping their wings against or through the water.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun One who squats
  • noun (Zoöl.) See Squat snipe, under Squat.
  • noun [Local, U.S.] the right claimed by the squatters, or actual residents, of a Territory of the United States to make their own laws.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun One who squats, sits down idly.
  • noun Australia, historical A large-scale grazier and landowner.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun someone who settles on land without right or title
  • noun someone who settles lawfully on government land with the intent to acquire title to it

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From squat +‎ -er.

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Examples

Comments

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  • Archaic meaning, Australia: a grazier, or station (ranch) owner. (The meaning of the word changed later in the twentieth century to mean a person who occupies or resides at a property illegally.)

    Down came the squatter, mounted on his thoroughbred

    Down jumped the troopers, one, two, three:

    "Whose that jolly jumbuck you've got in your tucker bag?

    You'll come a-waltzing matilda with me."

    --A.B. Paterson, "Waltzing Matilda"

    February 7, 2007

  • We still have the squattocracy in the western distict - remember Malcolm Fraser? Life wasn't meant to be easy.

    February 7, 2007

  • Fight the power!

    February 7, 2007