ˈrolling stone
Also rolling-stone.
[f. rolling ppl. a. or vbl. n.2]
1. In the prov. a rolling stone gathers no moss, or variants of this: see moss n.1 3 b.
The proverb, with the same or similar wording, is found in various languages from at least the 15th century.
| 1546 Heywood Prov. (1867) 26 The rollyng stone neuer gatherth mosse. 1581 Mulcaster Positions xxxvii. (1887) 156 [They] reape as much learning, as the rowling stone doth gather mosse. 1618 Breton Courtier & Countryman Wks. (Grosart) II. 8/2, I haue heard that roling stones gather no mosse. 1720 T. Boston Fourfold State (1797) 305 A rolling stone gathers no fog. 1853 Trench Prov. 45 The old Greek proverb, ‘A rolling stone gathers no moss’. 1886 ‘Sarah Tytler’ Buried Diamonds xxii, The sudden turning up of Jack as a roving brother, who, like a rolling stone, gathered no moss. |
2. A rambler, wanderer; a good-for-nothing.
| 1611 Cotgr., Rodeur,..a rolling stone, one that does nought but runne here and there. 1621 Sanderson Serm. I. 212 Some men are ever restless... But thes rowling stones carry their curse with them; they seldom gather moss. 1887 H. Smart Cleverly Won i. 1 It was odd that he should have been so much of a rolling-stone. 1892 Boston (Mass.) Jrnl. 6 Dec. 6/5 He was a shiftless fellow,—a rolling stone. |
| attrib. 1887 T. A. Trollope What I remember I. ii. 41 One of the results of such a rolling-stone life as mine has been. |
3. A cylindrical stone used for crushing, flattening, etc.,
esp. in the form of a heavy roller.
| 1611 Cotgr., Rollon, a rowler, a rowling stone. 1664 Evelyn Sylva (1679) 26 Stubbed oak is the fittest timber for the case of a cider mill, and suchlike engines, as best enduring the unquietness of a ponderous rolling stone. 1709 J. Ward Introd. Math. v. (1734) 402 A Cylinder (or Solid, like a Rolling-stone in a Garden). 1768–74 Tucker Lt. Nat. (1834) I. 474 A rolling stone, a wheel⁓barrow,..are fitted for peculiar uses of mankind. 1839 H. T. De la Beche Rep. Geol. Cornw., etc. xv. 494 The granite annually raised in the district and employed for bridges, pavements, rolling-stones [etc.]. 1846 Keightley Notes Virg. 353 It [the threshing-floor] was then made solid and level with rammers or a rolling-stone. |