To gather after a reaper, or on a reaped field; bring together from a scattered condition, as grain left after the removal of the main crop.Hence To collect in scattered or fragmentary parcels or portions; pick up here and there; gather slowly and assiduously.To gather stalks or ears of grain left by reapers; also, to collect or gather anything in a similar way.n. A handful of corntied together by a gleaner.n. Anything gathered or gleaned.n. A somewhat indefinite unit; a bunch: as, a glean of teazels. [Essex and Gloucestershire, Eng.] A glean of herrings, by a statute of Edward I., is 25.n. The afterbirth, as of a cow or other domestic animal; the cleaning.