Scattergoods

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. Refers to various small items or miscellaneous objects that are loosely gathered or spread about without a specific order
2. Denotes an assortment of unrelated goods or belongings dispersed in a casual or haphazard manner
3. Describes a collection of diverse articles or possessions scattered individually rather than kept together systematically

Etymology: A scattergood was, for centuries, a spendthrift: someone who squandered their property rather than keeping it. The compound is simply "scatter" plus "good" in its old plural sense of possessions, so the picture is of goods flung about and wasted. English writers used the term in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, often for a person who ran through an inheritance. The plural form shifts the focus from the spendthrift to the things themselves. Its sense of a loose heap of miscellaneous possessions, lying about unsorted instead of being kept in order, likely grew out of that same image of goods scattered in disarray.

Synonyms: miscellaneous goods, odds and ends, sundries, assortment, variety

Antonyms: bulk goods, uniform goods, homogeneous goods, single items, standard goods