What does scattergood mean?
Scattergood is a literary and now uncommon noun for a person who wastefully spends money or squanders possessions. Its name comes from the image of scattering something valuable: a scattergood disperses “good” rather than preserving or investing it. The term is strongly disparaging and generally conveys not merely spending but a habitual, careless disregard of resources. It belongs mainly to older British and American prose, where it served as a vivid moral label for a prodigal, spendthrift, or scapegrace. Today it may appear in historical writing, literary quotation, or deliberately archaic humour, but ordinary speakers would normally use spendthrift, wastrel, or prodigal instead. Although the word can be understood as a compound of scatter and good, its meaning is not restricted to literal money; in older usage, the idea could extend to any thoughtless waste of advantages, time, or opportunities. Its rarity makes it more useful for recognizing period language than as a precise modern label.
nounA person who wastefully spends or squanders money or possessions; a spendthrift. The term may also describe a heedless person who wastes advantages or opportunities.
- A person who wastefully spends or squanders money, possessions, advantages, or opportunities; a spendthrift or prodigal.
"The family regarded the reckless young man as a scattergood who would inherit and exhaust the estate in a few years."
"His uncle accused him of being a scattergood who squandered the profits on an ill-advised business."
"In the old moralizing language of the novel, the inheritance left to the heedless heir would only enrich a scattergood."
The plural is grammatically standard but rare because the word itself is now uncommon.
"Novelists portrayed the young scattergoods as generous with money that was not truly theirs to spend."
A scattergood literally scatters good: the word turns ordinary generosity into the opposite virtue of reckless waste.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Etymology of scattergood
Scattergood is an English compound formed from scatter and good. It arose in the early modern period and was used for someone who scattered away money, goods, or advantages rather than preserving them. Its later literary and figurative senses developed from this image of wasteful dispersal.
How scattergood is actually used
Now uncommon and chiefly literary or historical. It is strongly disparaging and is often used in older British and American prose for a prodigal or wastrel; modern speakers would normally prefer spendthrift, wastrel, or prodigal.