pinky

en-noun

pinky (countable and uncountable, plural pinkies)

“Here,” Nigel greeted him, “do try a spot of ‘pinky,’ it's ever so much fun, really.”

2006, Thomas Pynchon, Against the Day, Vintage, published 2007, page 262:

(uncountable, historical, slang, Australia) Methylated spirits mixed with red wine or Condy's crystals.


baby

→ Cornish: babi

→ Danish: baby

→ Dutch: baby

→ Finnish: baby

→ French: baby

desctree

→ French: bébé
→ Finnish: bébé
→ Portuguese: bebé
→ Romanian: bebe
→ Spanish: bebé

→ German: Baby
→ Lower Sorbian: baby
→ Upper Sorbian: baby

→ Interlingua: baby

→ Italian: baby

→ Norwegian Bokmål: baby

→ Norwegian Nynorsk: baby

→ South Slavey: bebí

→ Spanish: baby

→ Swedish: baby

→ Vietnamese: bé bi

From Middle English baby, babie (“baby”), a diminutive form of babe (“babe, baby”), equivalent to babe + -y/-ie (“endearing and diminutive suffix”). Perhaps ultimately imitative of baby talk (compare babble).

suf

Any very young animal, especially a vertebrate; many species have specific names for their babies, such as kittens for the babies of cats, puppies for the babies of dogs, and chicks for the babies of birds. See :Category:Baby animals for more.

גּוּר

and there are special terms for certain animals


tadpole

From Middle English tadpolle, taddepol, equivalent to toad + poll (“head”).

A type of cargo bike that has two wheels in front and one in back.


pupa

pupas (plural)
pupae (plural)
pupæ (plural)

Borrowed from New Latin, from a special use of Latin pūpa. Doublet of pupe.

The public is the pupae of the purposely purblind […]

1959 April 21, Walt Kelly, Pogo: The Complete Syndicated Comic Strips, Seattle, Wash.: Fantagraphics Books, published 2011, →ISBN, page 34:

(entomology) An insect in the development stage between larva and adult.


larva

en-noun

larva (plural larvas or larvae or larvæ)

larvas (plural)
larvae (plural)
larvæ (plural)

From Latin larva (“ghost-like, masked”).

թրթուր

an animal in such stage of growth — see also tadpole

The habits of the second nymphal stage are likewise similar to those of the larva stage.

1923, Bulletin of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, page 6:

Several possible explanations are advanced for a large decrease in numbers between the egg and larva stage, namely, drift of larvae from the sampling station, escape through the meshes of the net, sinking below the surface layers, and loss from mortality. A seasonally erratic egg to larva ratio is pointed out.

1954, Contribution - Hawaii Marine Laboratory, page 186:

An early stage of growth for some insects and amphibians, in which after hatching from their egg, insects are wingless and resemble a caterpillar or grub, and amphibians lack limbs and resemble fish.

The young larva bores into the tissue of a tobacco leaf, usually near the place where it has emerged from the egg, in cases where the egg was laid on a leaf, and mines into the leaf.

1920, Memoirs of the Department of Agriculture in India, page 84:

What does a mountain newt larva eat?

2020, Anne Sagner, Ichthy, diary of a newt larva, page 4:

In water of 5-6° C, herring hatch in about 22 days, at 11-12° C in 8–10 days. The newly hatched larva is about 6–8 mm long and at first depends on the food reserves of the yolk-sac.

1968, R. V. Tait, F. A. Dipper, Elements of Marine Ecology, page 344:

Breeding females of both the Lophogastrida and Mysida carry their embryos and larvae in a marsupium, within which their entire embryonic and larval development takes place.

2014, Joel W. Martin, Jørgen Olesen, Jens T. Høeg, Atlas of Crustacean Larvae, page 199:

A form of a recently born or hatched animal that is quite different from its adult stage.

In the fourteenth we find, but still in Latin, a quasi-historical drama, in the larva stage of monologue recitation, founded on a subject from the national annals—that of Ezzelino, tyrant-duke of Padua.

1883, The Edinburgh Review - Volume 158, page 64:

Man's larva stage is first announced by strong pathetic squalls; — Conscious knowledge of his helplessness, — dependency, appalls, — Evokes maternal sympathy,— for him she will provide,— Most proud mother, happy parent, as he nestles by her side.

1909, Frederick Joseph Duggan, Infinity ; Or, Nature's God, page 58:

The larva stage of the child's mind demands much forage material.

1910 November, “Teaching Pupils to Study”, in The Louisiana School Review, volume 18, number 3, page 132:

The larva stage possesses a libido of nutrition, if I may so express it, but not yet the libido sexualis.

1915, Nervous and Mental Disease Monographs - Volumes 19-22 -, page 34:

After they have fairly emerged from what may be termed the larva stage, so that they can make their way about, we see them experimenting with their bodies and exploring their surroundings. Babies handle; they taste, they feel with hands and mouths, they look, and they listen; they creep and walk and climb; later they stride, trot, jump, utilizing everything they can find in their play purpose of activity.

1930, American Childhood - Volume 16, page 10:

I would call the arrival and settlement of our forefathers in this country which we now call Ghana as the egg stage; the time between the birth of the Fante Confederacy and the time of the first Legislative Council as the larva stage; the time the Positive Action was declared as the pupa stage; and the 3rd of August, 1956, when the historic motion for independence was moved, as the full-grown stage.

1956, Gold Coast. Legislative Assembly, Debates - Part 1, page 205:

A vision in the larva stage uses our knowledge base to grow. We cannot see this process, but it goes on in the back of our mind, usually without our knowing it.

2021, Oleg Konovalov, The Vision Code: How to Create and Execute a Compelling Vision for Your Business, page 31:

We also have been in the larva stage of life. And many people will never abandon this stage. A larva is an adult of eighteen years or more. An adult that never grew up and just wakes up, work, pay bills, sleep, breathe, and so on.

2021, Reynaldo J Garcia, Go to the Next Level:

(figurative) A preliminary stage of someone or something, before it has fully matured, especially a time of growth rather than one of performance.


spat

en-verb

spat (third-person singular simple present spats, present participle spatting, simple past and past participle spatted)

spats (present singular third-person)
spatting (participle present)
spatted (participle past)
spatted (past)

Little Isabel leaped up and down, spatting her hands.

(US, dialect) To slap, as with the open hand; to clap together, as the hands.


filly

From Old Norse fylja (whence Danish føl), related to foal. Cognate with Dutch veulen, German Fohlen.


colt

colt (third-person singular simple present colts, present participle colting, simple past and past participle colted)

colts (present singular third-person)
colting (participle present)
colted (participle past)
colted (past)

From Middle English colt, from Old English colt, from Proto-Germanic *kultaz (“plump; stump; thick shape, bulb”), from Proto-Indo-European *gelt- (“something round, pregnant belly, child in the womb”), from *gel- (“to ball up, amass”). Cognate with Faroese koltur (“colt, foal”) Norwegian kult (“treestump”), Swedish kult (“young boar, boy, lad”). Related to child.

der

Never talk on't: / She hath been colted by him.

1611 April (first recorded performance), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Cymbeline”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iv], line 133:

(obsolete, transitive) To horse; to get with young.


foal

From Middle English fole, from Old English fola, from Proto-West Germanic *folō, from Proto-Germanic *fulô, from pre-Germanic *pl̥Hon-, from Proto-Indo-European *pōlH- (“animal young”) (cognate with Saterland Frisian Foole, West Frisian fôle, foalle, Dutch veulen, German Low German Fohl, German Fohlen, Fohle, Swedish fåle; compare also Ancient Greek πῶλος (pôlos), Latin pullus, Albanian pelë (“mare”), Old Armenian ուլ (ul, “kid, fawn”). Related to filly.

inh

(mining, historical) A young boy who assisted the headsman by pushing or pulling the tub.


calf

en-noun

calf (plural calves or (nonstandard) calfs)

calves (plural)
calfs (nonstandard plural)

From Middle English calf, kælf, kelf, from Old English cælf, ċealf;
also cognate with German Kalb (“calf”), Dutch kalf (“calf”) and Danish kalv (“calf”), from Proto-Germanic *kalbaz, further etymology unknown.

Leather made of the skin of the calf; especially, a fine, light-coloured leather used in bookbinding.

1915 (published), 1848 (first written), Elisha Kent Kane, Adrift in the Arctic Ice Pack
Our swell ceases with this wind, and the floes seem disposed to come together again; but the days of winter have passed by, and the interposing calves prevent the apposition of the edges

A chunk of ice broken from a larger glacier, ice shelf, or iceberg.

kalv

chunk of ice broken off of a larger glacier, ice shelf, or iceberg

the Calf of Man

some silly, doating, brainless calf

1627, Michaell Drayton [i.e., Michael Drayton], “Nimphidia. The Court of Fayrie.”, in The Battaile of Agincourt. […], London: […] A[ugustine] M[atthews] for VVilliam Lee, […], published 1631, →OCLC:

(informal, dated) An awkward or silly boy or young man; any silly person; a dolt.


calf

From Middle English calf, kalf, from Old Norse kalfi, possibly derived from the same Germanic root as English calf (“young cow”) (above). Cognate with Icelandic kálfi (“calf of the leg”).

Sure, his calves are a little weak, but the rest of his physique is so overwhelming, he should place high.

1988, Steve Holman, “Christian Conquers Columbus”, in Ironman, 47 (6): 28-34:

The muscle in the back of the leg below the knee.


brat

Clipping of bratwurst, from German Bratwurst.

There are many people loitering, eating ice cream, talking, eating brats.

2020, Brandon Taylor, Real Life, Daunt Books Originals, page 267:

(informal, Upper Midwestern US) Bratwurst.


bullet

bullet (countable and uncountable, plural bullets)

From Middle English bullet (“an official tag or badge of registration or identification”), from Old French bullete, diminutive of boule (“ball”). Later influenced by Middle French boulette and French boulet.

inh

Nakamura is a different animal at 15-minute rapid and five-minute blitz and even more so at one-minute bullet, and in this match he adopted a psychological approach which paid off brilliantly.

2020 August 21, Leonard Barden, “Chess: Carlsen fights back from brink to overcome Nakamura in 38-game epic”, in The Guardian:

Carlsen also has been engaging in online marathons of "bullet chess," exactly the kind of attention-disrupting, energy-draining stunt contenders are supposed to avoid. In a bullet game, each player has only one minute for all the moves. The pace is so rapid the games are hard to watch, much less play.

2021 November 24, Tyler Cowen, “Chess Is an Esport Now. Get Used to It.”, in The Washington Post:

Even today, when they're home, the siblings indulge in a friendly game or two. "We love playing bullet games. It's a format where we make really quick moves," he says, pausing to add, "Think of it like a super over in cricket."

2022 July 27, Srinivasa Ramanujam, “'Feels like a festival': Praggnanandhaa on Chess Olympiad and meeting Rajinikanth”, in The Hindu:

(chess, uncountable) Short for bullet chess.


brood

en-noun

brood (countable and uncountable, plural broods)

From Middle English brood, brod, from Old English brōd (“brood; foetus; breeding, hatching”), from Proto-Germanic *brōduz (“heat, breeding”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰreh₁- (“breath, mist, vapour, steam”).

der

As a hen doth gather her brood under her wings.

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Luke 13:34:

The young of certain animals, especially a group of young birds or fowl hatched at one time by the same mother.


duckling

From Middle English dokeling, dukling, dookelynge (“duckling”), equivalent to duck + -ling.

Good night, darling; take that kiss to your respected mother, and tell her with my compliments that we can’t afford to make ducks and drakes of the romance of our little pet’s life: she will hatch those birds for herself in due time, and remain cluck-clucking, wisely, but sadly, like a perplexed old hen, when her ducklings and drakelings have unexpectedly taken the water.

1858, “Edith Clarel: A Story from Three Points of View”, in The Money Bag: Literature, Politics, Finance, volume I, number 4, London: Daniel F. Oakey, […], page 232:

Referring to Table 1 it will be seen that if a breeding duck produces 40 marketable progeny each year (and in practice this should be achieved) half of which are ducklings and the other half drakelings, and these birds realise 2s. per lb. live weight, then that breeding duck would return approximately £15 10s. over feeding costs for the 12 months.

1951, Supplement to the Journal of the Department of Agriculture of Western Australia, volume 28, page 216:

Muscovy ducks with ducklings. This is the most popular breed for table purposes. They make weights of up to 5 lb. for ducklings at 13 to 14 weeks, and up to 9 lb. for drakelings at 16 weeks when correctly handled.

1961, Allan A[rthur] McArdle, Poultry Management and Production (Agricultural and Livestock Series), Sydney, N.S.W.: Angus and Robertson, page 563:


maggot

From Middle English magot, magotte, probably Anglo-Norman metathetic alteration of maddock (“worm", "maggot”), originally a diminutive form of a base represented by Old English maþa (Scots mathe), from Frankish *maþō, from common Proto-Germanic *maþô, from the Proto-Indo-European root *mat, which was used in insect names, equivalent to made + -ock. Near-cognates include Dutch made, German Made and Swedish mask.
The use of maggot to mean a fanciful or whimsical thing derives from the folk belief that a whimsical or crotchety person had maggots in their brain.

A soft, legless larva of a fly or other dipterous insect, that often eats decomposing organic matter.

maaier

dipterous insect's larva that eats decomposing organic matter

(We) We are the new diabolic
 (We) We are the bitter bucolic
 If I have to give my life, you can have it
 (We) We are the pulse of the maggots

2004, “Pulse of the Maggots”, performed by Slipknot:

(slang) A fan of the American metal band Slipknot.


maggot

en-adj

maggot (comparative more maggot, superlative most maggot)

more maggot (comparative)
most maggot (superlative)

(colloquial, Australia) Alternative form of maggoted (“drunk; intoxicated”)


fawn

From Middle English fawnen, from Old English fagnian, alternative form of fæġnian (“to celebrate”), whence Middle English fainen, English fain. Cognate with Old Norse fagna. See also fain.


cygnet

From Middle English cignet, signet, from Anglo-Norman cignet, diminutive of Old French cigne (“swan”), from Latin cygnus, cycnus (“swan”), from Ancient Greek κύκνος (kúknos, “swan”).

I am the cygnet to this pale faint swan,
Who chants a doleful hymn to his own death,
And from the organ-pipe of frailty sings
His soul and body to their lasting rest.


owlet

Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve

Noticeable features found in many of the owlets are two markings that often appear on the upper forewings.

2023, John Himmelman, Discovering Moths, page 39:


gosling

→ Irish: góislín

From Late Middle English goslyng (“gosling”), alteration (due to Middle English goos (“goose”)) of earlier gesling (“gosling”), of North Germanic origin, from Old Norse gæsling, géslingr (“gosling”), from gás (“goose”) + -lingr (“-ling”), equivalent to goose + -ling. Cognate with Danish gæsling (“gosling”), Swedish gässling (“gosling”). Compare also Low German gossel, gössel (“gosling”), German Gänslein (“gosling”).

Marta's gander was a magnificent snow-white bird: the object of terror to foxes, children and dogs. She had reared him as a gosling; and whenever he approached, he would let fly a low contented burble and sidle his neck around her thighs.

1988, Bruce Chatwin, Utz, London: Jonathan Cape, →ISBN; republished London: Vintage Books, 2005, →ISBN, page 50:

These Aments (we must no longer call them catkins) are composed both of male and female flowers; what Henry calls goslings in spring are the Aments of the willow tree ; his green goslings are female Aments , and , when mature , have the appearance of little tufts of wool, which appearance is caused by the downy material that crowns their feeds;

1797, Botanical Dialogues, Between Hortensia and Her Four Children, page 8:

When the oak puts on his goslings grey 'Tis time to sow barley night or day.

1893, “Tree Proverbs”, in The Journal of Education, volume 37, page 170:

The common Sallow or Goat Willow (Salix caprea) forms a small bush in rough places and the hollows left by old gravel-pits. It produces the “goslings” which children are fond of gathering at Easter .

1901, Edward North Buxton, Epping Forest, page 116:

In the afternoon: cut back the crack willow around the pool; the fluffy flowers fall on the water. Locally, the flowers are known as 'goslings'. Water. It has no motion of its own; it is the mechanic betrayer of other forces. the breeze gently drifts the goslings to the far shore.

2018, John Lewis-Stempel, The Wood: The Life & Times of Cockshutt Wood:

(dated) A catkin on willows, nut trees, and pines.


piglet

From pig + -let (diminutive suffix). Attested from 1855. Displaced Old English fearh.

Very little was this piglet,
And of course was not a big pig,

1855 December 10, “Mother Goose in Trochaics”, in Buffalo Morning Express, Buffalo, NY, page 4:


leveret

From Middle English leveret(te), from Old French leveret, diminutive of lievre (“hare”), from Latin leporem, of obscure origin.

[…] Shall I die like a leveret,
Without any resistance?—Help, help, help!
I am slain!

1623, John Webster, The Duchess of Malfi, act V, scene 5:

Fair Hand that can on Virgin-paper write,
 Yet from the stain of Ink preserve it white,
Whose travel o’er that Silver Field does show,
Like track of Leveretts in morning Snow;

1686, Edmund Waller, “Of a Tree cut in Paper”, in Poems, &c. written upon several occasions, and to several persons by Edmond Waller, London: H. Herringman:

As when two skilful hounds the leveret wind;
Or chase through woods obscure the trembling hind;
Now lost, now seen, they intercept his way,
And from the herd still turn the flying prey:
So fast, and with such fears, the Trojan flew;
So close, so constant, the bold Greeks pursue.

1720, Alexander Pope, transl., The Iliad of Homer, Book 10:

They heard Marvel squeal like a caught leveret, and forthwith they were clambering over the bar to his rescue.

1897, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, “chapter 16”, in The Invisible Man: A Grotesque Romance, New York, N.Y., London: Harper & Brothers Publishers, →OCLC:


joey

Unknown. Older and more general sources state that joey comes from an Australian aboriginal language (cited as joè), but newer sources that focus on Australian English and aboriginal languages say the origin is unknown. The Australian National Dictionary includes a sense of “young possum” with citations predating the earliest “young kangaroo” citations.

Among the kangaroo words that yield the most joviality and joy are those that conceal multiple joeys.

1998, Richard Lederer, Dave Morice, The Word Circus, page 129:

Sometimes a kangaroo word has more than one joey.

2005, Anu Garg, Another Word a Day, page 132:


grub

en-noun

grub (countable and uncountable, plural grubs)

From Middle English grubben, grobben, from Old English *grubbian, from Proto-West Germanic *grubb-, from Proto-Germanic *grubb- (compare Middle Dutch grobben (“to scrape, scramble, grab”), Old High German grubilōn (“to dig, search”), German grübeln (“to meditate, ponder”)), from Proto-Germanic *grub- (“to dig”) (see *grabaną).
The noun sense of "larva" is from Middle English grub, grubbe, grobbe, crubbe and may derive from the notion of "digging insect" from the verb above, or from the uncertainly related Middle English grub (“dwarfish fellow”). Compare West Frisian krobbe (“beetle”). The slang sense of "food" is first recorded 1659, and has been linked with birds eating grubs or with bub (“drink”).

cog

(Australia, slang) A despicable person; a lowlife.


grub

en-verb

grub (third-person singular simple present grubs, present participle grubbing, simple past and past participle grubbed)

grubs (present singular third-person)
grubbing (participle present)
grubbed (participle past)
grubbed (past)

to grub up trees, rushes, or sedge

They do not attempt to grub up the root of sin.

1846, Julius Hare, The Mission of the Comforter:

Yet there was no time to be lost if I was ever to get out alive, and so I groped with my hands against the side of the grave until I made out the bottom edge of the slab, and then fell to grubbing beneath it with my fingers.

[1898], J[ohn] Meade Falkner, Moonfleet, London; Toronto, Ont.: Jonathan Cape, published 1934, →OCLC:

(transitive, intransitive) To dig; to dig up by the roots; to root out by digging; often followed by up.


chick

en-noun

chick (plural chicks or (obsolete) chicken)

chicks (plural)
chicken (obsolete plural)

From Middle English chicke, chike, variation of chiken (“chicken", also "chick”), from Old English ċicen, ċycen (“chicken”). Sense of "young woman" dates to at least 1860 (compare chit (“young, pert woman”)). More at chicken.

The Aldis lamp flashes at the underside of each aircraft. It shows that the gear is down. Diegal is relaxing. This is such low responsibility, easy night duty. All the “chicks” (fighter aircraft) are home to roost except one.

2004, Joe Welzen, The Gutsy Stomach Walker, page 50:

(military, slang) A friendly fighter aircraft.


wolfling

From wolf + -ling. Compare Middle English wolfling (“a creature which is part human and part wolf”).


kitten

From Middle English kitoun, kytton, kyton, keton (“kitten”). Seemingly from, and usually explained as being from, unattested Anglo-Norman *kitoun, *ketun (compare Old French chitoun, cheton, chaton (“kitten”), diminutive of cat, chat (“cat”)); whence Modern French chaton (“kitten”). Similar words of Germanic origin may have reinforced this word; compare English kitling (“kit, kitten”), Low German Kitten (“kitten”), Icelandic kettlingur (“kitten”), Middle English chitte ("whelp, pup", see chit). The idea that kitoun, rather than being of Anglo-Norman origin, was in fact a purely Germanic derivation from one of these words is etymologically problematic, but cannot be definitively ruled out.

gloss

"whelp, pup", see <i class="Latn mention" lang="en">chit</i>

It was supposed to have happened thus: the cat had young kittens, and frequently carried them mice, and other animals its prey, and among the rest a young rat: the kittens, not being hungry, played with it, and when the cat came to give suck to the kittens, the rat likewise sucked her.

1752 January, The London Magazine, and Monthly Chronologer, page 243&244:

To the sounds, however, I paid no attention at first as I was much interested in the subject upon which I was writing; but at length my som Richard burst into my study, exclaiming that the kitten had climbed up to the top of a young ash tree, and could not get down again.

1844, The Kitten, the Religious Tract Society, page 1 & 2:

Jailing her on Wednesday, magistrate Liz Clyne told Robins: "You have shown little remorse either for the death of the kitten or the trauma to your former friend Sarah Knutton." She was also banned from keeping animals for 10 years.

2011 December 14, Steven Morris, “Devon woman jailed for 168 days for killing kitten in microwave”, in Guardian:

A young cat, especially before sexual maturity (reached at about seven months).


elver

Variant of eelfare, originally "brood of young eels", from Middle English *elfare, *elvare, from el (“eel”) + fare (“group of journeyers”). Equivalent to eel + fare.
Liberman instead connects the second element of this word to a putative Old English suffix *-for(e), but there is no need to posit such a suffix when the traditional etymology suffices. Furthermore, such a suffix is not securely attested, and the spelling of the word's earliest attestation (as yele fare, ell vare) implies Middle English /aː/.

af

When these glass eels enter freshwater they transform again into elvers – miniature versions of the adult eels.

2012, Caspar Henderson, The Book of Barely Imagined Beings, Granta Books, published 2013, page 69:


nymph

From Middle English nimphe, from Old English nymphē and Old French nimphe, both from Latin nympha (“nymph, bride”), from Ancient Greek νύμφη (númphē, “bride”). Doublet of nympha.

(Greek mythology, Roman mythology) Any female nature spirit associated with water, forests, grotto, wind, etc.

нимфа

mythology: water, forest or mountain spirit


puppy

From earlier puppie (“a woman's pet dog”), of uncertain origin, but probably from Middle English *puppee, *poupee, from Old French poupée, popée (“a doll; puppet”). More at puppet.
Mostly displaced native Middle English whelp (“puppy”), from Old English hwelp, whence Modern English whelp and whelpie.

A young dog, especially before sexual maturity (12–18 months)


imp

From Middle English impe, ympe (“tree branch; shoot, sprig; graft, scion; young tree, sapling, seedling; tree”) [and other forms], from Old English impa, impe (“shoot, sprig; graft, scion; young tree, sapling, seedling”), from impian, ġeimpian (“to graft”) (see etymology 1).

(British, colloquial) A supporter (or less commonly, a player) of the Lincoln City Football Club.


kid

en-noun

kid (countable and uncountable, plural kids)

From Middle English kide, from Old Norse kið (“young goat”), from Proto-Germanic *kidją, *kittīną (“goatling, kid”), perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *gʰaydn-, *ǵʰaydn- (“goat”) or Proto-Indo-European *gidʰ- (“kid, goatling, little goat”). Compare Swedish and Danish kid, German Kitz and Kitze, Albanian kedh and kec.
Sense of child since 1590s as cant, since 1840s in informal use.

der

I have three pairs of kid gloves. I've had kid mittens before from the Christmas tree, but never real kid gloves with five fingers.

1912, Jean Webster, Daddy-Long-Legs: Letter 3:

Only '90s kids will remember this toy.

He's been living in Los Angeles for years now, but he's a Florida kid.

(informal) A person whose childhood took place in a particular time period or area.

No, kid, you didn't do anything wrong; they did!

Here's looking at you, kid.

1942, Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein, Howard Koch, Casablanca, spoken by Rick (Humphrey Bogart):

(in the vocative) Used as a form of address for a child, teenager or young adult.


lamb

en-noun

lamb (countable and uncountable, plural lambs or (both dialectal) lamber or lambren)

lambs (plural)
lamber (dialectal plural)
lambren (dialectal plural)

From Middle English lamb, from Old English lamb, from Proto-West Germanic *lamb, from Proto-Germanic *lambaz, probably from Proto-Indo-European *h₁l̥h₁onbʰos, enlargement of *h₁elh₁én, ultimately from *h₁el-.
See also Dutch lam, German Lamm, Bavarian Lamperl, Danish lam, Swedish lamm, Finnish lammas, Scottish Gaelic lon (“elk”), Ancient Greek ἔλαφος (élaphos, “red deer”). More at elk.

cog

March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb

one may as well hang for a sheep as a lamb

(finance, slang) One who ignorantly speculates on the stock exchange and is victimized.

Holonym: Lambily

Alternative form: Lamb

Part of me revels in the campiness of Mariah’s butterfly metaphors and puppies-and-kittens existence. […] But I also genuinely love her music, including this album. I’m one of her lambs.

Her latest album, “Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel,” is her best work yet, a warmer and more subtle album that makes her more relatable to those of us who aren’t Mariah die-hards—or “lambs,” as she refers to them.

2010 February 15, Greg Kot, “Mimi cuts loose: Mariah Carey concert at Chicago Theatre shows that the diva can laugh at herself”, in Chicago Tribune, 163rd year, number 46, section 3, page 6:

This year, Ms. Carey debuted a new Las Vegas revue, and, to celebrate, a group of 36 “lambs,” mostly in their 30s and 40s, boarded a party bus and cruised the Vegas strip for about three hours.

2019 January 3, Rich Juzwiak, “In Praise of Their Diva”, in The New York Times, section D, page 1:

But when I saw Mariah in Detroit last year during the Caution World Tour, I was a proud lamb in my tour T-shirt, my very adult body suddenly transformed into my 14-year-old self when she emerged onstage.

2020 February 25, Chris Azzopardi, “I Love You (But Do You Love Mariah Carey?)”, in The New York Times:

Pride Month begins June 1, and Mariah Carey is giving her lambs plenty of new clothes to celebrate.

2022, “Mariah Carey releases her exclusive Pride merchandise”, in WRMF:

(slang) A fan of American singer, songwriter, actress, and record producer Mariah Carey (born 1969).


caterpillar

/ˈkætəˌpɪlə/

/ˈkætɚˌpɪlɚ/

/ˈkætəˌpɪlɚ/

From Middle English catirpel, catirpeller, probably from Old Northern French catepeluse (Modern French chatte + pileuse (“hairy cat”)), from Late Latin catta + pilōsa. The sense "rapacious, extortionate person" arose by association with obsolete piller (“plunderer”).

Bristow Castle, which they say is held
By Busbie, Bagot, and their Complices,
The Caterpillers of the Commonwealth,
Which I haue sworne to weed, and plucke away.

1595 December 9 (first known performance), William Shakespeare, “The life and death of King Richard the Second”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iii], page 33:

(obsolete) A rapacious, extortionate person preying upon the community.


fry

en-verb

fry (third-person singular simple present fries, present participle frying, simple past and past participle fried)

fries (present singular third-person)
frying (participle present)
fried (participle past)
fried (past)

From Middle English fryen, borrowed from Old French frire, from Latin frīgō (“to roast, fry”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰer-. Cognate with Ancient Greek φρύγω (phrúgō, “I roast, bake”), Sanskrit भृज्जति (bhṛjjati, “to roast, grill, fry”), भृग् (bhṛg, “the crackling of fire”). Replaced native Middle English hirsten, from Old English hierstan (“to fry”).

cog

He's guilty of murder: he's going to fry.

To be affected by extreme heat or current.

(chiefly US, transitive, intransitive, slang) To execute, or be executed, by the electric chair.

informal: be executed by the electric chair


fry

(usually in the plural, fries, US, cooking) A lamb or calf testicle.


fry

From Middle English frie (“spawn of fish, young or small fish, offspring, progeny, children”), probably from Old Norse frjó (“seed, semen”), from Proto-Germanic *fraiwą (“seed, semen, offspring”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)per-, *(s)prey- (“to strew, sow”). Cognate with Icelandic frjó (“pollen, seed”), Icelandic fræ (“seed”), Swedish frö (“seed, embryo, grain, germ”), Danish and Norwegian frø (“seed”), Gothic 𐍆𐍂𐌰𐌹𐍅 (fraiw, “seed”). Likely merging with Old French froiz, froie (“spawn, spawning”), from froier, freier (“to spawn”), from Latin fricō (“to rub”). The Middle English is attested earlier than the terms in Old French, and the Anglo-Norman forms frie, fry are borrowings from the Middle English.

cog

(now chiefly UK dialectal) Offspring; progeny; children; brood.


fry

Dialectal, of obscure origin. Perhaps related to or a corruption of frith (“a wood, forest", also "brushwood, wattle”), from Middle English fryth, frith (“forest, woodland, a fence of brush or wattle, hedge”).

unc

obscure


eaglet

He [Christopher North] speaks in his "Second Canticle" of "the imps," "the eaglets," "the young ones," "the bursting of the shells," as though it were the commoner occurrence for there to be several eaglets in a nest. This is not the case.

1861, Charles Boner, “The Golden Eagle”, in Forest Creatures, London: Longman, Green, Longman and Roberts, page 177:

Alas! in the morning the eaglet was gone; and, full of sorrow, they stooped to pick up the shining fleece with which the floor was spread. At their touch, every feather became a golden coin.

1879 January, Ellis Clare, “The Christmas Eaglet”, in Ballou's Monthly Magazine, volume 49, number 1, Boston: Thomes & Talbot:

[A]fter the ten days Arkirie came to the king and asked him to give him two eaglets.

1900, M. Gaster, “Art. XIII.—Contributions to the History of Aḥiḳar and Nadan”, in Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain & Ireland, page 308:

Once the eaglets are born—tiny balls of white fuzz—the adult eagles prove that birds can be as protective and solicitous of their young as humans. They'll rip food into bite-size pieces for the eaglets and stand ceaseless watch over the eyrie.

1962 July 5, Richard Petrow, “Last chance to save the Bald Eagle”, in Popular Science, volume 181, number 1, →ISSN, page 192:

The early days and weeks of an eaglet’s life are not without risks.

2024 March 6, Francine Kiefer, “Bald eagles offer webcam lessons on patience and parenting”, in The Christian Science Monitor:

The immature young of an eagle; an eagle chick.


kit

en-noun

kit (countable and uncountable, plural kits)

From Middle English kyt, kytt, kytte, from Middle Dutch kitte (“a wooden vessel made of hooped staves”). Related to Dutch kit (“tankard”) (see below). The further etymology is unknown. Perhaps from Proto-Germanic *kitjō-, *kut-, which would be related to the root of Dutch kot (“ramshackle house”), itself of non-Indo-European origin.
The transfer of meaning to the contents of a soldier's knapsack dates to the late 18th century, extended use of any collection of necessaries used for travelling dates to the first half of the 19th century.
The further widening of the sense to a collection of parts sold for the buyer to assemble emerges in US English in the mid 20th century.

der

A circular wooden vessel, made of hooped staves.


kit

A short form of kitten and/or kitling. From the 16th century (spelled kytte, kitt).
From the 19th century also extended to other young animals (mink, fox, beaver, muskrat, etc.), and to a species of small fox ("kit-fox"). Later usage (for other animals) perhaps influenced by chit.


kit

A dancing master's kit.

1681, Nehemiah Grew, Musæum Regalis Societatis. Or A Catalogue & Description of the Natural and Artificial Rarities Belonging to the Royal Society and Preserved at Gresham Colledge. […], London: […] W. Rawlins, for the author, →OCLC:

Prince Turveydrop then tinkled the strings of his kit with his fingers, and the young ladies stood up to dance.

1852 March – 1853 September, Charles Dickens, Bleak House, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1853, →OCLC:


whelp

From Middle English whelp, from Old English hwelp, from Proto-West Germanic *hwelp, from Proto-Germanic *hwelpaz (compare Dutch welp, German Welpe, Welfe, Old Norse hvelpr, Norwegian Nynorsk kvelp, Danish hvalp), from pre-Germanic *kʷelbos, of uncertain origin.

A tooth on a sprocket wheel (compare sprocket and cog).


tumbler

A movable obstruction in a lock, consisting of a lever, latch, wheel, slide, or the like, which must be adjusted to a particular position by a key or other means before the bolt can be thrown in locking or unlocking.

A variety of the domestic pigeon remarkable for its habit of tumbling, or turning somersaults, during its flight.

A beverage cup, typically made of stainless steel, that is broad at the top and narrow at the bottom commonly used in India.

One of a set of levers from which the heddles hang in some looms.


piper

From Middle English piper, pipere; equivalent to pipe + -er. Piecewise doublet of fifer.

A common European gurnard (Trigla lyra), having a large head, with prominent nasal projection, and with large, sharp, opercular spines.


squab

en-noun

squab (countable and uncountable, plural squabs)

Unknown. Possibly descended from Swedish dialect skvabb (“fatty, flabby”). First attested in the 17th century.

a. 1744, Alexander Pope (imitating Earl of Dorset), Artemisia, 1795, Robert Anderson (editor), A Complete Edition of the Poets of Great Britain, page 86,
On her large ſquab you find her ſpread, / Like a fat corpſe upon a bed, / That lies and ſtinks in ſtate.

[H]erds of shabby vampires, Jew and Christian, over-run the house, [...] punching the squabs of chairs and sofas with their dirty fists, touzling the feather-beds, opening and shutting all the drawers, balancing the silver spoons and forks, looking into the very threads of the drapery and linen, and disparaging everything.

1846 October 1 – 1848 April 1, Charles Dickens, “Retribution”, in Dombey and Son, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1848, →OCLC, page 591:

(countable) A thick cushion, especially a flat one covering the seat of a chair or sofa.


squab

en-verb

squab (third-person singular simple present squabs, present participle squabbing, simple past and past participle squabbed)

squabs (present singular third-person)
squabbing (participle present)
squabbed (participle past)
squabbed (past)

(transitive) To furnish with squabs, or cushions.


squab

en-adj

squab (comparative more squab, superlative most squab)

more squab (comparative)
most squab (superlative)

broken limbs of trees, eggs, and young squab pigeons precipitated from above

1836, Richard King, Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Arctic Ocean:


litter

en-noun

litter (countable and uncountable, plural litters)

From Middle English litere, lytere, &c., from Anglo-Norman litere, litiere, &c., from Old French litiere (“bedding; bed of loose straw; litter”), from Late Latin lectuāria (“bedding; blankets”), from Latin lectus (“bed; couch”) + -āria (“forming related nouns”), from Proto-Italic *lektos (“[thing] lain upon”), from *leɣō (“to lie down”), from Proto-Indo-European *legʰ-. Cognate with French lit and litière.

der

Reading and Leeds Festivals
Saint George Hare
litter
litter (disambiguation)

պատգարակ

platform designed to carry a person or a load

mikoshi

ceremonial Japanese litter for Shinto idols

Silkworms... must be well cleansed from the litter.

1835, Andrew Ure, The Philosophy of Manufactures, p. 232

The heir of an estate... troubled himself little about decorating his abode, and, if he attempted decoration, seldom produced anything but deformity. The litter of a farmyard gathered under the windows of his bedchamber, and the cabbages and gooseberry bushes grew close to his hall door.

1849, Thomas Babington Macaulay, The History of England..., Vol. I, p. 320

(uncountable) Animal bedding together with its dung.

Change the cat litter fer chrissakes. This place reeks.

(uncountable) Fuller's earth, clay pellets, wood chips, or other similar loose absorbent materials used for the waste of pet animals.

枯枝落叶层

layer of dead leaves and other organic matter


nipper

(Canada, slang, Newfoundland) A mosquito.

[…] ready backbiters, sore nippers, and spiteful reporters privily of good men.

a. 1569 (date written), Roger Ascham, edited by Margaret Ascham, The Scholemaster: Or Plaine and Perfite Way of Teaching Children, to Vnderstand, Write, and Speake, the Latin Tong, […], London: […] John Daye, […], published 1570, →OCLC:

(archaic) A European crab (Polybius henslowii).


flapper

In this case, slide the collar of the flapper over the overflow tube until it seats against the bottom of the flush valve.

2004, David Day, Albert Jackson, Popular Mechanics Complete Home How-to, page 356:


cockerel

From Middle English kokerel, equivalent to cock + -rel.

He had made arrangements with the cockerel to call him three-quarters of an hour earlier in the mornings instead of half an hour.

1943 November – 1944 February (date written; published 1945 August 17), George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], Animal Farm […], London: Secker & Warburg, published May 1962, →OCLC:


bud

en-noun

bud (countable and uncountable, plural buds)

From Middle English budde (“bud, seed pod”), from Proto-Germanic *buddǭ (compare Dutch bot (“bud”), German Hagebutte (“hip, rosehip”), regional German Butzen (“seed pod”), Swedish dialect bodd (“head”)), perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *bʰew-, *bu- (“to swell”).

In this slide, you can see a yeast cell forming buds.

A small rounded body in the process of splitting from an organism, which may grow into a genetically identical new organism.

пъпка

You got any buds?

(usually uncountable, slang) Potent cannabis taken from the flowering part of the plant (the "bud"), or marijuana generally.

(US, Canada, Australia, slang, usually in the plural) Cannabis that has been taken from the flowering part of the plant intended to be smoked.

Hey bro, want to smoke some bud?

(US, Canada, Australia, slang, uncountable) Marijuana.


bud

en-verb

bud (third-person singular simple present buds, present participle budding, simple past and past participle budded)

buds (present singular third-person)
budding (participle present)
budded (participle past)
budded (past)

Yeast reproduces by budding.

(intransitive) To reproduce by splitting off buds.


bud

I like to hang out with my buds on Saturday night.

Anna's best bud, John (Malcolm Cumming), harbors a secret crush on her, which is indicative of the lazier, more derivative portions of the story that simply repeat tropes rather than comment on them.

2018 November 27, April Wolfe, “Anna And The Apocalypse is a Holiday-horror Cocktail of Singing, Maiming, and Clichés”, in The A.V. Club, archived from the original on 2019-11-04:

[T]hen he shrugged his shoulders and said, with admirable philosophy: "Well, that's life, ain't it, bud?"

1946, George Johnston, Skyscrapers in the Mist, page 87:

(informal, chiefly Canada) Synonym of guy, term of address for a man or person.


eft

From Middle English evete, from Old English efete, of unknown origin.

Only these marishes and myrie bogs, / In which the fearefull ewftes do build their bowres, / Yeeld me an hostry mongst the croking frogs […].

1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book V, Canto X”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:

How did he like it when the live creatures
Tickled and toused and browsed him all over,
And worm, slug, eft, with serious features
Came in, each one, for his right of trover?

1844, Robert Browning, "Garden Fancies," II. Sibrandus Schafnaburgennis

A newt, especially a smooth newt (Lissotriton vulgaris, syn. Triturus punctatus), of Europe.


gilt

From Middle English gilt, gylt, from Old Norse gyltr; compare geld and yelt.

(UK, regional) A young female pig, at or nearing the age of first breeding.


puffin

From Middle English poffin, poffoun, puffon, equivalent to puff + -ing, or perhaps ultimately from Middle Cornish (compare Breton poc'han (“puffin”)).

Naturally the Chickies and the Gooverooskies and the Epatkas—the Burgomaster Gulls and the Kittiwakes and the Puffins, who are always looking for a chance to be rude—took up the cry, and—so Limmershin told me—for nearly five minutes you could not have heard a gun fired on Walrus Islet.

1894 May, Rudyard Kipling, “The White Seal”, in The Jungle Book, London, New York, N.Y.: Macmillan and Co., published June 1894, →OCLC, page 110:

Fratercula arctica
Fratercula arctica#Translingual

The Atlantic puffin (Fratercula arctica) or (by extension) any of the other various small seabirds of the genera Fratercula and Lunda that are black and white with a brightly-coloured beak.


stag

en-noun

stag (countable and uncountable, plural stags)

From Middle English stagge, steg, from Old English stagga, stacga (“a stag”) and Old Norse steggi, steggr (“a male animal”), both from Proto-Germanic *staggijô, *staggijaz (“male, male deer, porcupine”), probably from Proto-Indo-European *stegʰ-, *stengʰ- (“to sting; rod, blade; sharp, stiff”). Cognate with Icelandic steggi, steggur (“tomcat, male fox”). Related to staggard, staggon.

The stag will be held in the hotel's ballroom.

(countable) A social event for men held in honor of a groom on the eve of his wedding, attended by male friends of the groom; sometimes a fundraiser.


bunny

Surfers from Durban grew up on bunnies. You get the curry in the bread with the removed square chunk, used to dunk back in the curry.

2008, Steve Pike, Surfing South Africa, page 258:

(South Africa) Bunny chow; a snack of bread filled with curry.


fledgling

From fledge (“prepare for flying”) + -ling.

A young bird which has just developed its flight feathers (notably wings).


hopper

From Middle English hoppere, alteration of *hoppe (found in grashoppe (“grasshopper”)), from Old English *hoppa (“one who hops, hopper”), equivalent to hop + -er. Cognate with Dutch hopper (“hopper”), Swedish hoppare (“hopper, jumper”), Icelandic hoppari (“hopper”).


sore

From Middle English sor, from Old English sār (“ache, wound”, noun) and sār (“painful, grievous”, adjective), from Proto-West Germanic *sair, from Proto-Germanic *sairaz (adjective) from Proto-Indo-European *sh₂eyro-, enlargement of *sh₂ey- (“to be fierce, afflict”).
See also Dutch zeer (“sore, ache”), Danish sår (“wound”), German sehr (“very”); also Hittite [script needed] (sāwar, “anger”), Welsh hoed (“pain”), Ancient Greek αἱμωδία (haimōdía, “sensation of having teeth on edge”).

cog

non-rhotic, without the horse–hoarse merger

And indeed I blamed myself and sore repented me of having taken compassion on him and continued in this condition, suffering fatigue not to be described, […]

1885, Richard F. Burton, The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night:

[… they] were often sore pressed to follow the trail at all, and at best were so delayed that in the afternoon of the second day, they still had not overhauled the fugitive.

1919, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Jungle Tales of Tarzan:


bummer

From bum (“make unhappy”) + -er (agent noun suffix), originally US drug slang.

af

This young man never had a bummer in some 33 LSD trips. Every one of the them was a delight—everything under control. He needed only to snap his fingers, and down he came, anytime. But on Voyage 34, he finally met himself coming down an up staircase, and the encounter was crushing.

2000, “Phase I”, in Voyage 34: The Complete Trip, performed by Porcupine Tree:

(slang, dated, drug use) A psychedelic crisis; hallucinogenic drug use producing undesirable dysphoric psychological effects, most often fear, paranoia, and especially horrifying hallucinations; a bad trip.


parr

en-noun

parr (countable and uncountable, plural parrs or parr)

Compare Scottish Gaelic bradan (“salmon”).
For the salmon life stage, the word originates from the Middle English parren (“to enclose”), referring to the spots running along the side of the fish, resembling the bars of a fence.

Young salmon, at a stage between fry and smolt when they feed chiefly on invertebrates but cannot tolerate saltwater.


pullet

From Middle English polet, pulet, from Anglo-Norman pullet, Old French poulet (“young chicken”); polette (“young hen”), from poule (“hen”). Doublet of poult. Compare also Middle English pulle.


whitebait

whitebait (countable and uncountable, plural whitebaits)

The young of various species of fish, especially herrings, sprats or smelts

Food prepared from such fish, often deep fried and served as a starter or snack.


cosset

en-verb

cosset (third-person singular simple present cossets, present participle cosseting or cossetting, simple past and past participle cosseted or cossetted)

cossets (present singular third-person)
cosseting (participle present)
cossetting (participle present)
cosseted (participle past)
cosseted (past)
cossetted (participle past)
cossetted (past)

Perhaps from Middle English cotsete, from Old English cotsǣta (“cottager”), from cot (“cottage”) (Modern English cot (“cottage”) (archaic)) + -sǣta (“-sitter”); compare coscet. Compare German Hauslamm (literally “house lamb”), Italian casiccio.

ncog

The foam cossets your skin.

(transitive) To fondle; to touch or stroke lovingly.


jake

en-noun

jake (countable and uncountable, plural jakes)

It is possible that the governments have found the cause of the poisoned “jake” in their investigations into the Jamaica ginger deaths throughout the South and Southwest.

1930, United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Agriculture and Forestry, Administration of Federal Food and Drugs Act: Hearings..., page 1854:

(US, slang, uncountable) Jamaica ginger.


chrysalis

chrysalis (plural chrysalises or chrysalides or (rare) chrysalisses)

chrysalises (plural)
chrysalides (plural)
chrysalisses (plural rare)

From Latin chrysalis, from Ancient Greek χρυσαλλίς (khrusallís), from χρυσός (khrusós, “gold”), because of the color of some of them.

Amongst the particular signs testifying the same thing, are also those exhibited by worms which feed on herbs, which, when they are to undergo a metamorphosis, encompass themselves as with a womb, that they may be born again, being therein changed into nymphs and chrysalisses, and presently into beautiful butterflies, when they fly into the air as into their heaven, where the female sports with her male companion, as one conjugal partner with another, and they nourish themselves from odoriferous flowers, and lay their eggs, thus providing that their species may live after them: […]

1828, The Athanasian Creed, Extracted from the Apocalypse or Book of Revelations Explained, of Emanuel Swedenborg, Boston, Mass.: Adonis Howard, […], page 174:

The herbaceous or herbiferous produce had such gummy gelatinous properties, that tiniest tiddles incorporated themselves into huge chrysalisses, from whence monster butterflies egged it, all the world over, like snowberries, during a moist September, as soon as the blossom is by!

1857, Charles Hancock, Gaieties and Gravities for Holy Days and Holidays, London: Saunders and Otley, […], page 155:

Caterpillars, chrysalisses soon reveal / The future gandy butterfly.

1865, [Johann Wolfgang von] Goethe, translated by William Barnard Clarke, Translation of Goethe’s Faust, Iˢᵗ and IIⁿᵈ Parts, Freiburg: Schmidt, page 264:

Fanny was afraid. She was like an insect new-hatched from its chrysalis, naked and unprotected in a dawn she could not face.

1929, M. Barnard Eldershaw, chapter VII, in A House is Built, section VIII:

A project on butterflies! And caterpillars and chrysalisses and things, and lots of nice drawings, coloured with felt pens.

1979, Sheila Lavelle, My Best Fiend, London: Hamish Hamilton, →ISBN, page 165:

The pupa of a butterfly or moth, enclosed inside a cocoon, in which metamorphosis takes place.


silkworm

From Middle English silkwirm, from Old English seolcwyrm (“silkworm”), equivalent to silk + worm.

Any of various caterpillars of moths that produce silk cocoons, especially Bombyx mori, the source of most commercial silk.


nymphet

From nymph + -et (“diminutive”), first attested 1612. The second sense was popularized by Vladimir Nabokov's 1955 novel Lolita.

Of the nymphets sporting there In Wyrrall, and in Delamere.

1612 Michael Drayton, Poly-Olbion I. xi. Argt. 171


zoëa

From New Latin zōaea, zōēa, from Ancient Greek ζωή (zōḗ, “life”) (compare ζῷον (zôion)).

(zoology) A larval stage of certain decapod crustaceans, especially of decapods such as crabs and certain Anomura, also called the copepod stage, characterized by spines on the carapace and rudimentary thoracic and abdominal limbs.


juvenile

Borrowed from Latin iuvenīlis (“youthful; juvenile”), from iuvenis (“young; a youth”) + -īlis (suffix forming adjectives indicating a relationship or a pertaining to). Iuvenis is ultimately derived from Proto-Indo-European *h₂yuh₁en- (“young”), from *h₂óyu (“long life; lifetime”) (from *h₂ey- (“age; life”)) + *h₁én (“in”).

Every childhood seems to have exactly such a juvenile in its midst and mists. He's the boy who refuses to fear the opposite sex, purely because everyone else embraces that particular fear, and he's the type who is unafraid to make a decision.

2005, Markus Zusak, “The Kiss (a Childhood Decision Maker)”, in The Book Thief, Sydney, N.S.W.: Picador, →ISBN; republished New York, N.Y.: Alfred A. Knopf, 2013, →ISBN, page 49:

A person younger than the age of majority; a minor.


shoat

A sheep–goat hybrid (whether artificially produced or the result of animals from these species naturally intermating).


hatchling

From hatch + -ling. Sense 2 in reference to the term crack one's egg (“realize one is transgender”).

(transgender slang) A person who has (especially recently) realized that they are transgender.


codling

From Middle English codling, codeling, equivalent to cod + -ling.

A hake (cod-related food fish), notably from the genus Urophycis.


polliwog

From earlier polwigge, from Middle English polwygle, equal to poll (“head”) + wiggle.

So Tommy sang the following verse: “The cold got worse, The frog got hoarse, Till croaking he scared a polliwog!”

1897, L. Frank Baum, “The Story of Tommy Tucker”, in Mother Goose in Prose:


pup

It could be any dude, as long as you really want to fuck him. It could be a... a twink, a bear, an otter, a circuit queen, a chub, a pup, a gipster, a daddy chaser, a leatherman, a ladyboy, a Donald Duck. Donald Duck's a gay guy who's been kicked out of the Navy.

2017 April 23, “Success Failure”, in Silicon Valley, season 4, episode 1, spoken by Russ Hanneman (Chris Diamantopoulos):

Mentorship, I learned from the Fog City pups, plays a huge role in their family business, where the pack hierarchy comes into play.

2019 February 5, Mike Miksche, “Teaching Young Dogs Old Tricks”, in Slate, New York, N.Y.: The Slate Group, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2024-06-22:

(Pups are apparently different from "furries," who dress up in animal suits. And they are both different from "bunnies," which the author didn't explain and which I have neither heart nor stomach to Google.)

2019 April 29, Christie Blatchford, “Christie Blatchford: What ’puppy play’ enthusiasts do behind closed doors shouldn’t be for our reading pleasure”, in National Post, Toronto, Ont.: Postmedia Network Canada Corp., →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2024-06-23:

(sex, slang) Someone who participates in pup play (the sexual practice of role-playing as a young dog).


farrow

From Middle English *farow, *fargh (found only in the plural faren), from Old English fearh (“piglet”), from Proto-West Germanic *farh, from Proto-Germanic *farhaz, from Proto-Indo-European *pórḱos, from *perḱ- (“to dig”).
See also Old High German farah, Middle Irish orc (“piglet”), Latin porcus, Proto-Slavic *porsę (“pig, piglet”), Lithuanian par̃šas, Kurdish purs. Doublet of pork.

Aha! I know you, gammer! Hamlet, revenge! The old sow that eats her farrow!

1922 February, James Joyce, “[Episode 15]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC:

She is the womb and the tomb: the sow that eats her farrow.

1949, Joseph Campbell, The Hero with a Thousand Faces:


owling

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-owling.wav


yearling

From Middle English yerling, yerlyng, equivalent to year + -ling. Cognate with Dutch jaarling (“yearling”), German Jährling (“yearling”).

"But is a plebe forbidden to stroll here?"
"If a plebe did have the brass to try it," replied Anstey slowly, "I reckon he would have to fight the whole yearling class in turn."

1910, H. Irving Hancock, Dick Prescott's Second Year at West Point, page 84:

As a yearling, he admitted to doing his part in ensuring that plebes knew their place at the Academy, […]

2014, Michael E. Haskew, West Point 1915 (page 57)

(US) A sophomore at West Point military academy.


suckling

From Middle English sukling, sukeling, sokeling, equivalent to suck + -ling. Cognate with Middle Dutch sogelinc (“suckling”), Dutch zuigeling (“suckling”), German Säugling (“suckling”).

A young mammal not yet weaned and still being fed milk by its mother.


juvenal

From Latin iuvenālis (“youthful”), from iuvenis (“youth”).

Of a young bird: that has its first flying plumage.


bullock

en-verb

bullock (third-person singular simple present bullocks, present participle bullocking, simple past and past participle bullocked)

bullocks (present singular third-person)
bullocking (participle present)
bullocked (participle past)
bullocked (past)

From Middle English bullok, from Old English bulluc, from Proto-West Germanic *bulluk, corresponding to bull + -ock (diminutive suffix). Compare Old Dutch bullok (“bullock”).

Yes, you villain, you have defiled my own bed, you have; and then you have charged me with bullocking you into owning the truth.

1749, Henry Fielding, Tom Jones, Folio Society, published 1973, page 47:

So you never knew when you were gonna fall foul of a furious bullocking. So it became a case of bullocking management, basically. You know, how can I stave off the stress and the bullying for another few days.

2017, podcast "Untold - The Daniel Morgan Murder", episode "Master of the Dark Arts", from minute 11:18


lambkin

A lambkin's snowy fleece

1781, Richard Hole, Homer's Hymn to Ceres, Exeter: B. Thorn & Son, p. 38

She has no real cognisance, dear lambkin, of anything at all.

1919, Ronald Firbank, Valmouth, Duckworth, page 28:


pullus

(ornithology) A chick; a young bird in the downy stage.


poult

From Middle English pult, a variant of pulet, polet, from Old French poulet (“young fowl”), diminutive of poule (“hen”), from Latin pulla. For the development of the stressed vowel, see poultry. Doublet of pullet.

‘I even questioned,’ said he, ‘whether there will not be, in about a week's time, some nice turkey powts.’

1792, Charlotte Smith, Desmond, Broadview, published 2001, page 82:

After an hour of fishing I saw a flock of turkeys on the opposite bank and shot one of the poults.

2013, Philipp Meyer, The Son, Simon & Schuster, published 2014, page 19:

A young bird, a chick; now especially, a young game bird (turkey, partridge, grouse etc.).


planula

(zoology) The larva of a hydrozoan, which is free-swimming and covered in cilia.


yeanling

But in due season here may flocks of worth
Twin yeanlings bear;

1886, Anna Swanwick (translator), The Dramas of Aeschylus, 4th edition, Eumenides, page 183, lines 903–904

The newly born offspring of a goat or sheep.

اوغلاق

the newly born offspring of a goat or sheep


weanling

Any young mammal that has been recently weaned.


puggle

puggle (third-person singular simple present puggles, present participle puggling, simple past and past participle puggled)

puggles (present singular third-person)
puggling (participle present)
puggled (participle past)
puggled (past)

British dialect (Hertfordshire, Essex), from pug (“to poke”) + -le (“frequentative suffix”).

suffix

1828, "Philip Fidget," The Confessions of Philip Fidget, in The Spirit and Manners of the Age, New Series, Volume 1, page 417,
I am no sooner seated by a fire, but my hand instinctively fumbles after the poker, and I proceed to puggle the glowing embers, until (except timely warning prevent) I have displaced the whole into the fender.

He puggled around in the oil cavity with his little lead pencil until it slipped out of his fingers and went down into the oil cavity.

1919, James Francis Hobart, Millwrighting, McGraw-Hill, page 222:

(UK, regional) To poke around a hole with a stick, as to explore, remove obstacles, etc.


doodlebug

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-doodlebug.wav

Soon after Richard was adopted, Orwell's flat was wrecked by a doodlebug.

2009, Robert McCrum, The masterpiece that killed George Orwell:

(informal, British) The V-1 flying bomb.

(historical, "doodlebug tractor") An automobile converted into a cheap tractor for a small farm during the Second World War.

(entomology) An antlion larva (Myrmeleontidae).

(entomology, UK) A cockchafer (genus Melolontha).

(obsolete) Individual self-propelled train cars.


cria

Borrowed from Spanish cría (“kid; pup; cria”).

A young South American camelid (llama, vicuna, guanaco or alpaca).


sounder

From Middle English soundar, sownere, equivalent to sound + -er.

An instrument used in telegraphy in place of a register, the communications being read by sound.


nyas

From Old French niais (“bird from the nest”), from Latin nidus (“nest”).


eyas

Alteration of nyas, by misanalysis of a nyas as an eyas.

A young hawk or falcon in the nest, or that has not yet fledged, especially one that will be trained for falconry.


squeaker

An animal that squeaks.
Any of genus Synodontis, of catfish.


leatherjacket

Any of several brightly coloured tropical fishes, of the family Balistidae, including the filefish and the triggerfish; leatherfish

Any of several Atlantic fishes, of the genus Oligoplites, that have a leathery skin; leatherjack


wiggler

(physics) A magnet designed to make a beam of charged particles follow a curving path in an accelerator.


cowling

She nuzzled between the legs—a bull calf. She continued to nuzzle and clean the little pea-green body that was blue with white patches about his cowling parts.

2003, David Gilet, The Yellow Dot Plague and Other Tales:


hogget

From Middle English hogget, from Anglo-Norman hoget and an Anglo-Latin hogettus.

They were kept in separate flocks; first there were the hoggets, then the oldest of the younger lambs and lastly the very young ones all kept apart from one another […]

1900, Samuel Butler, transl. The Odyssey, Book IX., page 113

(chiefly UK, New Zealand) A young colt or sheep of either gender from about 9 to 18 months of age (until it cuts 2 teeth).

Jungschaf

a young sheep from about 9 to 18 months of age

(chiefly UK, New Zealand) The meat of a young sheep.

(chiefly UK) A young boar of the second year.


fingerling

From Middle English fyngyrlynge, equivalent to finger + -ling, from having the size of a human finger.

Oh, but those little crab-lingered fingerlings really wanted to get in! Now some were trying to claw up through an old knothole whose bole had aged and didn’t sit true in the plank. […] But here came the dwarf opening her door, and the spiderlets melted away.

2011, Gregory Maguire, “The Patchwork Conscience of Oz”, in Out of Oz (The Wicked Years), New York, N.Y.: William Morrow, →ISBN, page 160:

(by extension) Any finger-sized version of something typically larger.


small fry

en-noun

small fry (plural small fry or small fries)

From small + fry, first use appears c. 1577, in the publications of John Dee.


leafworm

From Middle English *leefworm, *lefwurm, from Old English lēafwyrm (“caterpillar”), equivalent to leaf + worm.

Any caterpillar that eats the leaves of plants.


doeling

Before your kids are born, decide how many doelings you will keep and stick with it.

1994, Carla Emery, The Encyclopedia of Country Living ninth edition, Sasquatch Books, Seattle Washington, page 715

A female domestic goat of less than one year of age.


buckling

From the verb to buckle, equivalent to buckle + -ing.

(geology) A folding into hills and valleys.

Engineers decided not to use hydraulics, to ensure there was no twisting or buckling to the 80-tonne girder structure.

2021 July 14, “Network News: Network Rail engineers raise Machynlleth bridge”, in RAIL, number 935, page 27:

The action of giving in (slightly) to pressure or stress by developing a bulge, bending or kinking (with the eventual risk of collapsing).

flambage

kinking, bending or bulging under pressure or stress


dogie

Unknown.
Possibly an abbreviation of dough-guts, the pot bellied appearance of a malnourished calf. Possibly the transliteration of the slang word dobie/dobe/doby, pejoratively meaning inferior. Since dogie and dobie in reference to an orphaned calf both appeared in print around the same time (1880-1888), it is possible that dogie is the original and dobie is the transliteration.

When she was a child, her father often gave her orphaned calves to look after, and every so often, she would fold the grown ones in with the steers when they were shipped off to Fort Worth. She made enough money off her dogies to make investments in stocks […]

2013, Philipp Meyer, The Son, Simon & Schuster, published 2014, page 49:

(colloquial) A motherless calf in a range herd of cattle; a calf separated from its cow.


nestling

It was associated, to them, with vague sweet memories of loving nestlings in mother's arms, of soft warm coddlings before the fire, of slow rocking to and fro in the little, low, flag chair, and gradual droppings off to sleep […]

1871, Kate Neely Hill Festetits, Actions speak louder than words:


woolly bear

As Bourne came out, he could see shells exploding by the dump, with some shrapnel bursting, woolly-bears they called them, overhead.

1929, Frederic Manning, The Middle Parts of Fortune, Vintage, published 2014, page 236:

‘A Woolly Bear was used for demolition, and could be compared with our 5.9's. It burst on impact, made a big hole and left a tremendous cloud of black smoke.’

2000, Harold A Skaarup, Whiz Bangs and Woolly Bears, page 12:

(military slang, historical) An explosive shell that gives out dense smoke when it bursts.


fatling

Lo I have prepared my dynner, myne oxen and my fatlinges are kylled, and all thinges are redy, come unto the mariage.

1526, [William Tyndale, transl.], The Newe Testamẽt […] (Tyndale Bible), [Worms, Germany: Peter Schöffer], →OCLC, Matthew:

The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them.

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Isaiah 11:6:

A young animal (especially a calf or lamb) which has been fattened for slaughter.


freemartin

unk

Etymology unknown.

"Has your cat been spayed?" "I didn't need to: she's a freemartin."

Any female animal born sterile or otherwise infertile.


chilver

The chilver and pur lambs, at 2d. per head for about 40 weeks, will cost

1812, General View of the Agriculture of the County of Dorset, page 407:

For the last few years I have put out my Chilver lambs to keep from the middle of October til Lady-day upon a dry, sheltered, and healthy farm, andd as the result of this plan, I have found that the lambs did quite as well there with cut swedes and hay as they would on my high exposed farm during the winter upon the same allowance of roots and hay, with the addition of a quarter of a pound of best cake per day for each lamb.

1868, British Farmer's Magazine - Issue 54, page 114:

Among the purchasers of the Chilver lambs were Mr. Morrison, a lot at £170; Mr. Taylor, £80; Mr. Buxton, :£33 10s, Mr Holdsworth £34

1874, The Farmer's Magazine - Volume 76, page 259:

To repairing Hurne bridge 1 chilver shepe.

1898, The New England Historical and Genealogical Register, page 66:

If anything has to go short, it will not be the heifers or chilver lambs, as they call their yearling ewes ; and in fact , as I have already said, except in the occasional seasons of drouth, the Dorset ewe during the four or five years of her life never knows what it is to want.

1898, Wool Markets and Sheep - Volumes 8-9, page 2:

In the summer and autumn, the chilver lambs are frequently folded, being fed on grass, rape, turnips, and hay, from the latter end of summer till the following spring.

1970, William Marshall, Southern and peninsular departments, page 280:


brancher

None of the brancher instructions have any effect whatsoever on any flags; instead, they are the instructions which look at the flags.

1983, Richard Mansfield, Machine Language for Beginners, page 69:

This is pretty typical for a C-written brancher.

1999, Mickey Kawick, Real-time Strategy Game Programming Using DirectX 6.0, page 37:

(programming) That which branches, or jumps to another instruction location within a program.


falconet

Any of various small, tropical Asian falcons of the genus Microhierax found in Southeast Asia.

sokolík

any of various small, tropical Asian falcons of the genus Microhierax found in Southeast Asia


mealworm

The larval stage of the mealworm beetle (Tenebrio molitor), a species of darkling beetle.


cockling

These cocklings cocker'd we bewail too late, When that we see our off-spring gaily bent, Women manwood, and men effeminate.

1725, Sir Philip Sidney, The works of the Honourable Sir Philip Sidney:

Take warning in time, cocklings; look sharp — but not in this direction, if you please.'

1858, The Knickerbocker: or, New-York monthly magazine, volume 54, page 521:

'That ere our pretty Cocklings learn to crow, To pamper Lust they must to Market go?

1920, The Pennsylvania magazine of history and biography, volume 44, page 74:


pluteus

(zoology) The free-swimming larvae of echinoderms.


cub

From earlier cubbe. Origin unknown. According to Pokorny, from Proto-Germanic *kubb-, from Proto-Indo-European *gup- (“round object, knoll”), from *gew- (“to bend, curve, arch, vault”).
Compare Icelandic and Old Norse kobbi (“seal”), Old Irish cuib (“whelp”). Compare also English cob.

unknown

der

(by extension) The young of certain other animals, including the bear, wolf, lion and tiger.

for terms specific to any particular animal

גּוּר

young of mammals, including domesticated ones

Swain has interviewed 67 reporters on 16 metropolitan dailies in 10 cities — from cubs to veterans — who talk candidly […]

1978, The Journalism Quarterly, volume 55, page 652:

[…] from competing publications and the editors of publications that might buy freelance material from cubs.

2018, Randall S. Sumpter, Before Journalism Schools:

A man who reared ten cubs and three cutties.

1993, Ray Givans, No Surrender, Castlecaulfield, Lapwing Publications, →ISBN, page 14:

The point of the example is educational, moral, and the moral qualities of the stories attracted Peter Flanagan who remembered them from childhood and told them to the cutties and cubs when he was, for them, a funny old man.

2016 September 12, Henry Glassie, The Stars of Ballymenone, Indiana University Press, →ISBN, page 229:

(Northern Ireland, Ulster) A boy or young man.


cub

en-verb

cub (third-person singular simple present cubs, present participle cubbing, simple past and past participle cubbed)

cubs (present singular third-person)
cubbing (participle present)
cubbed (participle past)
cubbed (past)

unk

unknown

He knew that, only a few hours from London, the Hunt was cubbing over his ancestral and much-mortgaged acres, while his own horse ate its head off in a stable.

1943, Stuart Palmer, The Puzzle of the Silver Persian:


kitling

From Middle English kiteling (“kitten, kit”), from Old Norse ketlingr (“kitten”), diminutive of kǫttr (“cat”), equivalent to cat + -ling.
Cognate with Icelandic kettlingur (“kitten”), Faroese kettlingur (“kitten”), Norwegian ketling (“kitten”), Swedish källing (“kitten”), Danish killing (“kitten”). Compare English catling, of similar formation. See also kitten.

(archaic) Any young animal, especially a kitten; kit.


ephyra

(zoology) An immature medusoid stage of a scyphozoan jellyfish once it breaks off from its segmenting polyp.


leptocephalus

From (obsolete) genus name Leptocephalus, equivalent to Ancient Greek λεπτός (leptós, “thin, slim”) + κεφαλή (kephalḗ, “head”).

der

There they spawn, and from the fertilized eggs emerge the leptocephali, which then ride on currents all the way back to Europe.

2012, Caspar Henderson, The Book of Barely Imagined Beings, Granta Books, published 2013, page 69:

The flat, transparent larva of an eel, originally thought to be a distinct species.


doveling

On one of its lower branches was fastened a dove-cote, ingeniously made of willow wands, plastered with adobe, and containing so many rooms that the whole tree seemed sometimes a-flutter with doves and dovelings.

She began to wring her hands. "Oh, my poor doomed dovelings . . . my darling star-crossed daughters . . ."

2007, Lucretia Cole, The King of Amphiboly:

Their guan beaks, coupled dovelings, the poorotten, leafing their livers, nieces of the cloud . . . Life! Life! This is life!

2007, César Vallejo, Clayton Eshleman, The Complete Poetry:


nauplius

]
Borrowed from New Latin Nauplius (former genus name) (coined by Danish naturalist Otto Friedrich Müller (1730–1784) who mistakenly thought the larvae were a separate genus of animal), from Latin nauplius (“argonaut, paper nautilus (genus Argonauta)”), from Ancient Greek ναύπλιος (naúplios, “type of shellfish”), from ναῦς (naûs, “ship”) + πλέω (pléō, “to sail”); compare Latin Nauplius (“mythological king of Euboea”), from Ancient Greek Ναύπλιος (Naúplios, “mythological founder of the city of Nauplia (Nafplio), a son of Poseidon and Amymone”).
The plural nauplii is from Latin nauplius + -iī (plural of -ius).

cog

The oval body, with the abdomen not yet differentiated, and bearing no limbs; the (usually) three pairs of limbs, representing the first and second antennæ and mandibles of the adult, together with the single eye, are the distinguishing characteristics of the nauplius stage.

1870 November 16, A[lpheus] S[pring] Packard, “The Development of Limulus Polyphemus”, in Memoirs of the Boston Society of Natural History, volume II, Boston, Mass.: Boston Society of Natural History, published 1872, →OCLC, page 163:

Here is an embryo, or young form, which has just escaped from the egg, and is hurrying off seawards to "see life," without doubt, and to begin life in earnest as well. You now behold a little body, which, roughly described, we shall say has a triangular shape. It has a tail behind, and the shield or "shell" with which the little body is covered, is prolonged in front and at its side-angles or corners into spines or horns. Three pairs of feet, or appendages that resemble these organs, are possessed by the infant barnacle, the two hinder pairs being forked at their tips and provided with long bristles. A single eye appears in front of the two foremost "feet;" and a mouth, stomach, and intestine are discovered within this little body. Thus provided within and without, this little Cyclopean creature swims merrily through the sea. In this stage it is universally named the Nauplius.

1877, Andrew Wilson, “Some Animal Histories”, in Robert Brown, editor, Science for All, volume I, London, Paris, New York, N.Y.: Cassell, Petter, Galpin & Co., →OCLC, page 80, column 1:

Fairy-shrimps are primitive crustaceans, most of which live in temporary ponds, roadside ditches, or marshes that dry up in sumer. They lay thick-walled eggs that withstand summer drying and winter freezing, lying dormant in the mud until they hatch out as naupliuses when wetted by the first heavy spring rain.

1987, Ralph [Morris] Buchsbaum, Mildred Buchsbaum, John Pearse, Vicki Pearse, “Lobsters and Other Arthropods: Crustaceans”, in Animals without Backbones, 3rd edition, Chicago, Ill., London: University of Chicago Press, →ISBN, page 345:

It is not certain that phaseluses are trilobites and not naupliuses of crustaceans or an extinct group of arthropods that has yet to be recognized.

1997, Roger L[eroy] Kaesler, editor, Treatise on Invertebrate Paleontology: Part O, Arthropoda 1, Trilobita Revised, revised edition, volume 1 (Introduction, Order Agnostida, Order Redlichiida), Boulder, Colo.: Geological Society of America; Lawrence, Kan.: University of Kansas, →ISBN, page 187, column 2:

The copepod nauplii concentrations were significantly different among stations and by depth (Appendices 3 and 4).

2001, Naureen A. Qureshi, Nancy N. Rabalais, “Distribution of Zooplankton on a Seasonally Hypoxic Continental Shelf”, in Nancy N. Rabalais, R[obert] Eugene Turner, editors, Coastal Hypoxia: Consequences for Living Resources and Ecosystems (Coastal and Estuarine Studies; 58), Washington, D.C.: American Geophysical Union, →ISBN, page 72:

I suggest that several species of nauplioids hybridized with representatives of several groups of arthropods to give them nauplius larvae. […] The occurrence of nauplius larvae in crustacean taxa appears to be almost random, and it bears little relationship to adult morphology or to evolutionary history. This is consistent with the proposal that nauplii were acquired independently and at various times, and it challenge the widely held view that nauplii played a fundamental role in crustacean evolution.

2003, Donald I[rving] Williamson, “Arthopods”, in The Origins of Larvae, revised edition, Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, →ISBN, page 172:

Only nauplii that are attracted to the light at the top of the hatching tank should be collected, since these are the healthy ones.

2007, Aquaculture Management and Conservation Service, Fisheries and Aquaculture Management Division, FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture Department, “Pre-spawning Procedures”, in Improving Penaeus monodon Hatchery Practices: Manual Based on Experience in India (FAO Fisheries Technical Paper; 446), Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, →ISBN, section 3.13.2 (Nauplii), page 47:

The taxonomic distribution of nauplii within Crustacea raises questions, however, about the evolution of a nonfeeding but swimming nauplius from an embryonized nauplius. Most malacostracans lack a free nauplius stage. Euphausiaceans and dendrobranchiate shrimp, which hatch as nonfeeding nauplii, are the exceptions. Inferred phylogenies of malacostracans imply that either the ancestor lacked a free nauplius and free nauplii subsequently evolved again, or that egg nauplii evolved multiple times[…].

2018, Richard R. Strathmann, “Larvae and Direct Development”, in Gary A. Wellborn, Martin Thiel, editors, Life Histories (The Natural History of the Crustacea; 5), New York, N.Y.: Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 158:

(zoology) A crustacean larva that has three pairs of locomotive organs (corresponding to antennules, antennae, and mandibles), a median eye, and little or no segmentation of the body.


goatling

The February kid he should retain, also the full-grown goat; the goatling he should sell, also its kid, unless he prefers using it for the table. Thus he has not only a good supply of milk, but he has an early kid ready for next year, […]

1907, The Quarterly Review, volume 207, page 119:


bullpup

From bull + pup. The firearms sense originated from firearm designers in the United States during the 1930s. The unconventional configuration of bullpup rifles was compared by analogy to bulldog puppies, which were considered "squat, ugly, but still aggressive and powerful".

(firearms) A firearm configuration in which the trigger is located forward of the magazine and breech, as opposed to a conventional configuration in which the trigger is located rear of the magazine and breech.


swanling

From swan + -ling, formed by analogy with duckling, gosling, etc. Compare German Schwänlein.

Suddenly I feel myself become small as a swanling, tucked into the swan's feathers.

2004, Pauline Somers, Dreams Within Dreams:

Slim ran over to the pond and unleashed the excited swanlings. They followed Moose and Slim to a quiet backwash of the river and glided gracefully into the water. Moose sat down on a little hillock and listened to Slim talking to the swanlings.

2007, Hubert Schuurman, People of the Swan:

The narrative concerns a female duck who hatches four dark ducklings, and when the fifth turns out to be a white “swanling,” the father duck more or less accuses his wife of adultery.

Bruno Bettelheim What this is really about is how you and your own dear swanling can rest securely in the feeling of belonging together when you experience daily life differently because others treat you differently.

2011, Gail Steinberg, Beth Hall, Inside Transracial Adoption:

So close, swanling, do not hesitate. Her eyes went to the sun hanging between night and day and then to Wulfsun. I cannot leave him to such a fate. Without me, he is a dead man.

2015, Betina Lindsey, Swan Bride: The Swan Maiden Trilogy - Book One:


bum calf

At the start of calving season, there was another bum calf, Ferdinand, whose mother had abandoned him.

2005, Lynn Parr, Cowgirl: A Home on the Wyoming Range, page 149:

I could do it all — I could play their game until I dropped — but I would never own a square foot of land, a bushel of oats or a bum calf in my own name.

2002, Judy Blunt, Breaking Clean, page 291:

She usually manages to be busy feeding some bum calf or wrangling the horses or something.

1992, Teresa Jordan, Cowgirls: Women of the American West, page 83:

"I feel like a bum calf when you do this to me," Madeleine said and when her mother said, "What?" Madeleine said, "Never mind."

1989, Gretel Ehrlich, Heart Mountain, page 114:

A young heifer or bull which has been orphaned or abandoned; it must be adopted by another cow, steal milk, or be bottle-fed in order to survive, and is therefore often a runt.


leppy

When those big bands take off, the mares never come back for those leppies. We were branding one time and saw a little bunch move out and a mom left a leppy behind.

2006, Paula Morin, Honest Horses: Wild Horses in the Great Basin, page 105:

Out on the range, he would have been a stunted leppy.

2003, American Cowboy, volume 10, number 4, page 90:

I have heard a famous rodeo announcer crack the same old joke every year, "A leppy is a little calf whose ma has died, and whose pa has run away with another cow."

1978, Sarah E. Olds, Twenty Miles From a Match: Homesteading in Western Nevada, page 44:

(slang, US) A young animal, particularly a cow calf or bull calf, a lamb, or a colt, which has been abandoned or orphaned.


bardie

[…]Burns signals her distance from the Classical Muses, and his position as more bardie than bard.

1998, Carol McGuirk, Critical Essays on Robert Burns, page 168:

(Scotland) A minor poet or bard; used as a self-deprecatory epithet by Robert Burns.


brandling

en-noun

brandling (countable and uncountable, plural brandlings)

The young or parr of the salmon, so named from its markings being, as it were, branded.


bear-whelp

From Middle English bere-hwelp, equivalent to bear + whelp.


troutling

1747, Charles Jarvis (translator), The Life and Exploits of Don Quixote de la Mancha by Miguel de Cervantes, Dublin: Peter Wilson, Volume 1, Book 1, Chapter 2, p. 173,
So there be many troutlings, answered Don Quixote they may serve me instead of one trout; for I would as willingly be paid eight single reals, as one real of eight: and the rather, because perhaps these troutlings are like veal, which is preferable to beef […]

‘[…] I dare say some trout in the river—hey?—the stream looks lively.’
‘Middling, only—poor gray troutlings, Sir—not a soul cares to fish it but myself,’ he answered.

1863, Sheridan Le Fanu, chapter 20, in The House by the Churchyard, London: Macmillan, published 1899, page 95:

They winnowed the creek with basketwork weirs for every finger-long troutling that came down in it,

1904, Mary Hunter Austin, The Basket Woman, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, page 27:

2012, Simon Brett, Blotto, Twinks and the Bootlegger’s Moll, New York: Felony & Mayhem Press, 2014, Chapter 15, p. 110,
‘ […] Did this Choxy do anything else, except look at you like a pike at a troutling?’


troutlet

1816, James Brydges Willyams, The Influence of Genius, London: J. Hatchard, Part 1, stanza 37, p. 21,
The brook beneath, thro’ which the troutlet shy / Shot swiftly on, and baffled all his skill;

As, pent in an aquarium, the troutlet / Swims round and round his tank to find an outlet,

1906, Ambrose Bierce, The Cynic’s Word Book, page 67:

He has a nice taste in the arts that has come to him by the way of socks, spats and slips, and of these he has a large and happy collection, which he laughs at jollily in public […] but in the privacy of his chamber he sometimes spreads them out like troutlet on the river’s bank and has his quiet thrills of exultation.

1914, J. M. Barrie, “Rosalind”, in Half Hours, London: Hodder and Stoughton, page 101:

Farther along I came to a stream and, resting on its bank, counted many troutlets lying on the bottom among the stones.

1979, Scott O’Dell, The Captive, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, page 121:


wolfkin

Kite and kestrel, wolf and wolfkin, from the wilderness, wallow in it.


mousekin

“Frisk about, pretty little mousekin,” says grey Grimalkin, purring in the corner, and keeping watch with her green eyes.

1857–1859, W[illiam] M[akepeace] Thackeray, The Virginians. A Tale of the Last Century, volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury & Evans, […], published 1858–1859, →OCLC:

Dufleur blinked at the stuffed oblong bit of gray cloth that had originally been a mousekin for Fairyfoot. The ears and tail were all gone. The fabric was nubby and snagged, with a couple of bits gone, showing the padding.


caponet

Some little fragments , that his haunches wore;
Or sure that caponet.

1624, George Chapman, Juvenal's Fifth Satire:


lionel

From Old French [Term?], diminutive of lion.


birdikin

Mrs. Prior and her basket were gone when we repaired to the drawing-room: having been hunting all day, the hungry mother had returned with her prey to her wide-mouthed birdikins.

1860 January–June, W[illiam] M[akepeace] Thackeray, Lovel the Widower, London: Smith, Elder and Co., […], published 1861, →OCLC:


gnatworm

He that would behold a very anomalous motion, may observe it in the Tortile and tiring stroaks of Gnatworms

1658, Sir Thomas Browne, Hydriotaphia, page 160:

Here a rich insect-life had developped:^([sic]) Argynnis, wasps and Syrphidae, besides numerous dancing gnatworms.

1909, Adolf Severin Jensen, “On the Mollusca of East-Greenland”, in Meddelelser om Gronland, page 345:

The fry of kaluga fish, gnatworms, freshwater prawns, mysids, etc.

1962, Lev Semenovich Berg, Freshwater Fishes of the U.S.S.R. and Adjacent Countries, page 55:


porket

Adorned in white, a reverend priest appears, / And offerings to the flaming altars bears— ; / A porket, and a lamb that never suffered shears.

1697, Virgil, “The Twelfth Book of the Æneis”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:

[…] his yards abound with poultry, and his fields with flocks and herds of kids, lambs, and porkets.

1838, William Howitt, The Rural Life of England:


jashawk

Apparently an altered form of eyas + hawk.


porkling

And serue thee in winter, more ouer than that,
to shut vp thy porklings thou mindest to fat

1557 February 13 (Gregorian calendar), Thomas Tusser, A Hundreth Good Pointes of Husbandrie, London: […] Richard Tottel, →OCLC; republished London: […] Robert Triphook, […], and William Sancho, […], 1810, →OCLC:


catling

From cat + -ling. Compare kitling, catkin. According to the OED, the sense of a surgical knife may be an independent word.

The operator […] grasping the soft parts immediately below, raises them so as to facilitate the passage of a double-edged knife or catling across the face of the bones […]

1852, Joseph Pancoast, A Treatise on Operative Surgery:

[…] after Esmarch we hold back the bloody torrent which once gushed forth after the catling; and Listerizing with Lister's spray we bar all passage into gaping wounds of motes that people the sunbeam and breed havoc in the tract of the sanguineous life stream.

1878, Maryland Medical Journal: Medicine and Surgery, volume 4, page 284:

(surgery) A double-edged, sharp-pointed dismembering knife.


skaddon

Borrowed from Ancient Greek σχαδών (skhadṓn, “larva of the bee or wasp”).

bor+

The reaſon is, that the vveather keeping them in, they can doe nothing but breed and hatch their schadons: and when they goe abroad, they bring in groſſe Bee meat, Ambroſia and vvater, vvherewith to feed them; but can finde nothing fit to lay vp in ſtore.

1623, Charles Butler, The Feminine Monarchie, London: Joseph Haviland, page 92:

This is a way hath been practised by the Ancients, and hath been much endeavoured after to be revived again, though not with any good success; for if you take away any part of their Combs in the Spring, they are then full of Skaddons, which spoil the Honey, and also destroy the breed of your Bees.

1669, John Worlidge, Systema Agriculturae, London: J. C., published 1675, page 186:

One ſays, in September, or any Time after they have done breeding (elſe the Honey will be corrupted by the Shaddens in the Combs) […]

1742, William Ellis, The Modern Husbandman, London: T. Osborne; M. Cooper, published 1744, page 107:

(UK, dialect, obsolete) The larva of a bee.


beaverling

The wife stumbled into the water, and as soon as her loot was wet, she immediately resumed her old shape as a beaver, her son became a beaverling, and the brooklet, changing to a roaring river, bore them to the lake.

(diminutive) A small, young, or juvenile beaver.


bearling

From Middle English berling, equivalent to bear + -ling.

While waiting at the inn up drove a Pau acquaintance in the person of the Marquis de Cherizet, out of whose pony-carriage was lifted a square box, which proved to contain a poor little bearling of about a month old, whose mother had been shot, and itself captured, […]

1871, “May-Day among the Mules”, in Charles Dickens, editor, All the Year Round:

(diminutive) A small, young, or juvenile bear.


hoglet

At birth, newborn hoglets are pink, blind, and completely helpless.

In nature, hoglets that age would follow their mother out of the nest and learn from her how to procure food by digging in the ground.

2018, Massimo Vacchetta, Antonella Tomaselli, A Handful of Happiness: How a Prickly Creature Softened a Prickly Heart, unnumbered page:

If the hog parents develop the disease, you can be pretty sure the hoglets will too—even when they’re raised in different places, fed different diets, cared for by different owners.

2021 August 12, Noelle Mateer, “Looks That Quill: The Dark Side of Hedgehog Instagram”, in Wired:


fausen

The wave-sprung entrails, about which fausens and other fish
Did shoal,

[1611?], Homer, “Book XXI”, in Geo[rge] Chapman, transl., The Iliads of Homer Prince of Poets. […], London: […] Nathaniell Butter, →OCLC; republished as The Iliads of Homer, Prince of Poets, […], new edition, volume I, London: Charles Knight and Co., […], 1843, →OCLC:


bipinnaria

From Latin bis (“twice”) + pinna (“feather”).

(zoology) The larva of certain starfishes as developed in the free-swimming stage.


dogling

The day she came home to find that our dogling had gone to live permanently with the man who spaded up our back yard it seemed for a time that there was no balm in Gilead.


fishling

[…] said an older woman, bending over her, "hush, little fishling! Ichuk, my son, is dead, but we will get thee another man."

My fingers moved subtly, and now Fiacha was a tiny raven no bigger than a bee, a little speck of darkness that spun out of the fixing charm as easily as a fishling escapes the herring net, […]

2008, Juliet Marillier, Child of the Prophecy:


foxling

The tender foxling, not arrived at the maturity of slyness, who never tasted chicken of his own stealing, shall take him without a ruffle of his plumage — only by pronouncing its dingy brown to be rich crimson.

1837, The Idler, and breakfast-table companion

The foxling made himself thoroughly at home. Seizing on a huge turkey's foot from the Sprite's larder, he dragged it into a dark corner, where he growled over it quite horribly.

1904, Alfred Emanuel Smith, Francis Walton, New Outlook:

A little or young fox; kit; a fox whelp.


sheepling

He will also give me His spirit to assist and comfort me in all temptations and afflictions and to make my heart confident and certain so as not to doubt, that I am my Lord's dear sheepling, and He my faithful Shepherd, [...]

It happened that a young sheepling stood there. The horrid wolf had a desire for a dinner of spring lamb, but felt some stings of conscience, so for a plea he made out that the sheepling was his enemy.

1896, William Lesley Mason, The stenographer's companion:


horseling

Two of these that she was about to chase and fondle, were not aristocratic horselings, they were but the rough and sturdy children of rough and sturdy dams and sires ; born to the plough, and the heavy waggon, [...]

1874, Bertha De Jongh, The sisters Lawless:

Thork astride the pony raced after, the horseling running in sheer panic.


puffling

These fish are brought to the fluffy little Puffins in their snug nests inside of a burrow or under a slab of rock. The babies are called “Pufflings.”

1962, Robert Porter Allen, The Giant Golden Book of Birds: An Introduction to Familiar and Interesting Birds of the World, New York, N.Y.: Golden Press, →OCLC, page 54, column 2:

Visit Iceland this August and you could help to rescue pufflings – baby puffins – who get confused by town street lights and crash into towns when leaving their burrows to fly over the Atlantic for the first time.

2006 May 7, “Escape’s picks of the week: The wildlife holiday”, in The Observer, London, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2014-09-22:

Whee-er-er, whee-er-er! the puffling cries because he is hungry. Mama puffin arrives and lays her mouthful of live fish close to the front of the burrow.

2007, Katherine Zecca, A Puffin’s Year, [Camden, Me.]: Down East Books, →ISBN:

When they're old enough the young puffins, or pufflings as they're called, have to fly off to find food.

2009 September 3, “Kids patrol to help lost puffins”, in CBBC Newsround, archived from the original on 2016-03-06:

Both parents feed the infant puffling until it is very fat, then leave the chick, who must make its own way to the sea.

2012, Arin Murphy-Hiscock, “Puffin”, in Birds: A Spiritual Field Guide: Explore the Symbology & Significance of These Divine Winged Messengers, Avon, Mass.: Adams Media, →ISBN, page 155:


paralarva

(zoology) The planktonic (moving about with the water current) stage of a young cephalopod just after it has hatched.


siredon

From Latin Sīrēdones, alternative form of Sīrēnes (“the Sirens”) from Ancient Greek Σειρηδώνες (Seirēdṓnes) plural of Σειρηδών (Seirēdṓn) alternative form of Σειρήν (Seirḗn, “Siren”).

(zoology, obsolete) A larval or neotenic salamander (e.g. the axolotl, Ambystoma mexicanum).


hawkling

The young nestlings of hawks; these hawklings being untrained, and good for little in falconry.

1851, Agnes Strickland, Elizabeth Strickland, Lives of the queens of England:

The day's tragedies had begun; the east was warm with color, and streamers of light were woven through the clouds; but I thought that, somewhere near me, the mocker's' mate was sitting on her nest, and that somewhere, further away, there were young hawklings who, also, have a right to life.

1913, The Oriole - Volumes 1-4 - Page 18

It was a bird, a small hawkling. A baby. And as she watched, it began to stretch its wet, feeble wings.


lobsterling

In the first few days of the fourth stage the lobsterlings are good swimmers — this is their "redeeming vice" — but the swimming is strong and bears no comparison to the aimless drifting movement characteristic of larval stages.

1910, Albert Davis Mead, A method of lobster culture:

The approach of the molt seems to start the lobsterling on its course to the bottom; accordingly when this is delayed until after the fourth stage, it probably does not often occur until the approach of the succeeding molt.

1911, Francis Hobart Herrick, Natural history of the American lobster:


sharkling

A sharkling is more easily disposed of, for his teeth will set him free, though the hook be attached to the stoutest gimp, and as he fights madly he is pretty certain in a few moments to have severed the gut.

1888, William Senior, Near and far: an angler's sketches of home sport and colonial life - Page 258:

Now for many days she has no rest at all With the solicitude of the mother hen for her chicks she watches over that group of sharklings, shepherded by the pilot whom they are rapidly outgrowing, sheltered in her bosom and fed, yes fed, though often the mother feels as if vultures were tearing at her liver.

1904, Ellery Sedgwick, Leslie's Monthly Magazine - Volume 58 - Page 604:

Gary muttered, for he had seen what trailed the big gray shark almost like a part of her — six sharklings that followed her every movement with perfect precision.

Least I'm not as schizo as hybrid Tina was— that sharkling did one rough mutation.


lambling

I have seen the lamblings skipping / In sunshine and in mist; […]

1843, Punch Or The London Charivari - Volume 5 - Page 83

These woolly lamblings were immensely affected by his exhortations, and when he gave out the hymn, there was such a negro chorus about the house as might be heard across the Potomac — such a chorus as would never have been heard […]

1905, William Makepeace Thackeray, The works of William Makepeace Thackeray:

These two pivots of the Great Wheel, blended, had brought men, women and children in their thousands, to kill some miserable lambling . . . on the temple steps in stonement for their sins […]

2007, Hugh B. Urban, Tantra: Sex, Secrecy, Politics and Power in the Study of Religion - Page 115:

So tell me, lamblings, what's gonna keep a big bad supernatural predator from munching down on you succulent little morsels?” he asked, thoroughly creeping me out.

2015, John Conroe, College Arcane, page 74:


fawnling

Slay not that my musk-deer fawnling, Hunter! Prithee, have thou shame Of her night-black eye nor bind her With thy lasso long and strait.

2012, John Payne Hafiz, The Collected Poems of Hafiz:


batling

When the batling was eight days old he fell, fluttering.

His flexible wings, wrapped round him, serve him as bed-clothes, and his mate carries the batling clinging to her breast even when she flies out to forage.

“Now if you don't mind; I have some 'batlings' to feed, if you catch my drift.” He smiled, nodding a subtle goodbye before turning towards the open window.


antling

Certainly, the kicking of the imprisoned antling is apparent enough to attract even the most stupid nurse, and the vigor of the motions, perhaps even the beginning of them, might easily give warning of the proper time for cutting the envelop.

1876, American Entomological Society, Transactions of the American Entomological Society - Volume 5 - Page 289:

This antling was, as indeed all the larvae and cocoons appeared to be, of the dwarf caste.

1884, The Annals and magazine of natural history:

Some of these caves were used as nurseries for eggs, larvaa, and antlings; [...]

1905, Harper's Magazine, volume 111, page 297:

Fortunately it so "happens " — if that be the lawful word — that its puparium is invariably formed at the posterior pole of the ant cocoon, directly opposite the anterior pole from which, as the point next to its jaws in its recumbent position, the antling emerges, and to which, as the point of fracture, the strain and force within and without are directed.

1909, Henry Christopher McCook, Ant communities and how they are governed: