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Glite Dictionary
to crawl with

to crawl with

42 5.1
To be full of many animals or people, often in an unpleasant way
  • phrasal verb
translation icon : estar lleno de
  • The abandoned building was crawling with rats, making it impossible to enter.

A Witcher crawling with scruples like a fox pelt with fleas.

Examples

  • The place is crawling with reporters.

    Eraser (1996)

  • This place was crawling with kids yesterday.

    Camp Hideout (2023)

  • Now, this place is crawling with press.

    Fly Me to the Moon (2024)

  • That place is gonna be crawling with people.

    Daredevil (2003)

  • The place was crawling with security.

    The Outsider (1997)

  • The city is crawling with cops.

    They Live (1988)

  • This place is crawling with giant lizards.

    Super Mario Bros. (1993)

  • "If that was in London, it would be crawling with tourists," he observes.

    Academic text (2002)

  • The place I go to is positively crawling with well-behaved kids.

    Blog text (16)

  • Today, the site in the Indian state of Karnataka is crawling with pilgrims, tourists, and neo-hippies.

    Academic text (2009)

Synonyms

to crawl
vsto crawl with
79 3.3

To be full of people or creatures moving around

is filled in an unpleasant and infested way

Antonyms

empty
∞ 1.0

Not containing anything

to clear
∞ 1.5

To remove people or things from a place

How Crowded

packed with
70 2.5
to crawl with
42 5.1
crowded
222 1.0
populated
2.5
emptiness
14 3.6

Surface Forms

crawl with infinitive
crawled with past
crawled with past participle
crawling with present participle
crawls with third person singular

Morphology

crawl + with

The meaning is partially derivable: knowing 'crawl' (movement by many small creatures) plus 'with' (accompanied by) allows a learner to infer that something is full of or inhabited by crawling things. However, the stative idiomatic use ('the garden crawls with insects' = is infested/teeming) is a metaphorical extension of the literal motion sense and may not be fully predictable to a B1 learner without exposure.

Etymology

Crawl with comes from the image of small animals, like ants or rats, literally crawling all over a place so it is covered by them. That's why saying a place is crawling with something now means it is 'full of' or 'infested with' people or things.