ambul-, ambulat-, -ambulate, -ambulating, -ambulation -ambulator, -ambulatory, -ambulant, -ambulic, -ambulism, -ambulist

1. To go at a slow, easy walking pace; to stroll; to saunter: "He ambled around the park."
2. With reference to a horse, to go at a slow pace with the legs moving in lateral pairs and usually having a four-beat rhythm.
3. An ambling gait.
4. A slow, easy walk or a gentle pace; a stroll.

1. A specially equipped motor vehicle, airplane, ship, etc., for carrying sick or injured people, usually to a hospital.
2. A vehicle designed and equipped for carrying people to and from a hospital.
2. Formerly a field hospital; that is, on a field of battle where the wounded were carried out on stretchers, etc. by "walking bearers".

"Ambulance" was borrowed from French hopital ambulant, mobile hospital, or literally, "walking hospital," from Latin ambulantem and ambulare, "to walk."

Historically, soldiers wounded in battle usually stayed where they fell until it was dark or until the end of some particular combat when they could be carried or dragged off for treatment.

This situation didn't change until 1240, when Italy's Misericordia di Firenze, the first known emergency-care service, was founded. Although primitive horse-drawn conveyances for the wounded made occasional appearances—at the Battle of Málaga in 1487, for example—it wasn't until 1792 that ambulances became a regular part of the battlefield scene.

It was at this time that Baron Dominique-Jean Larrey, a French army surgeon, introduced what he called the ambulances volantes, or "flying field hospitals". Such conveyances were covered, portable litters filled with bandages to stop the flow of blood and to bind the wounds of soldiers on the battlefield. The transporter was also called the hopital ambulant; that is, "walking hospital" or "traveling hospital."

One of the first "modern" ambulance systems appeared during the American Civil War, when Dr. Jonathan Letterman, medical director of the Army of the Potomac, assigned two horse-drawn ambulances to every regiment of 500 infantrymen. The Geneva Convention, in 1864, recognized military ambulances, declaring that the vehicles, the wounded they carried, and the medics that operated them, should be considered and treated as neutrals.

1. Moving or walking around; moving around from place to place.
2. Walking or in a walking position; specifically, ambulatory; such as, "She was an ambulant patient and so she didn't need a wheel-chair."

1. To walk about or to move (walk) from place to place.
2. To walk or move from one place to another.

Walking and so moving from place to place.

To move from place to place by walking.

1. Someone who walks about; a walker.
2. An instrument for measuring distances; also called a perambulator.

A covered place for walking, as in a cloister.

1. Pertaining to, or capable of walking: "It was an ambulatory exploration of the city."
2. Adapted for walking, as the limbs of many animals.
3. Moving around or from place to place; not stationary."
4. Not confined to bed; able or strong enough to walk: "He was an ambulatory patient."
5. Serving patients who are able to walk: "They offered an ambulatory care center."
6. In law, not fixed; alterable or revocable: "He left an ambulatory will.
7. An aisle surrounding the end of the choir or chancel of a church.
8. The covered walk of a cloister.

Divination by observing how someone walks or by taking a walk.

An abnormal desire to go for extended walks at every opportunity.