animal

Humans, like other animals, need air to breathe and food to eat.

It cannot be denied it [the chameleon] is (if not the moſt of any) a very abſtemious animall, and ſuch as by reaſon of its frigidity, paucity of bloud, and latitancy in the winter (about which time the obſervations are often made) will long ſubſist without a viſible ſuſtentation.

1650, Thomas Browne, “Of the Cameleon”, in Pseudodoxia Epidemica: […], 2nd edition, London: […] A[braham] Miller, for Edw[ard] Dod and Nath[aniel] Ekins, […], →OCLC, 3rd book, page 133:

(sciences) Any eukaryote of the clade Animalia; a multicellular organism that is usually mobile, whose cells are not encased in a rigid cell wall (distinguishing it from plants and fungi) and which derives energy solely from the consumption of other organisms (distinguishing it from plants).

en:any nonhuman member of the kingdom Animalia

(loosely) Any member of the kingdom Animalia other than a human.

Ancient nomads, wishing to ward off the evening chill and enjoy a meal around a campfire, had to collect wood and then spend time and effort coaxing the heat of friction out from between sticks to kindle a flame. With more settled people, animals were harnessed to capstans or caged in treadmills to turn grist into meal.

2013 July-August, Henry Petroski, “Geothermal Energy”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 4:

(loosely) A higher animal; an animal related to humans.

(colloquial) A tetrapod; a land-dwelling nonhuman vertebrate.

A warm-blooded animal; a mammal or bird.

Birds are as popular as animals in the toy kingdom, especially pigeons, owls and domestic hens.

1971, Gwen White, Antique Toys And Their Background, page 54:

I spent my summer studying the animals and birds of the two islands.

When he's hungry my toddler opens his mouth like an animal instead of asking us to feed him.

My students are animals.

Own me, I'll let you play the role
I'll be your animal

2019, “Bad Guy”, Finneas O'Connell, Billie Eilish O'Connell (lyrics), performed by Billie Eilish:

She speculated that things could deteriorate later: “I think they’re scared of the English, which is fair; we are animals.”

2024 July 14, Rachel Hall, quoting Jodie White, “‘I’ve never seen owt like it’: England fans in Benidorm in high spirits before Euro final”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:

(figuratively) A person who behaves wildly; a bestial, brutal, brutish, cruel, or inhuman person.

He's a political animal.

en:person of a particular type specified

(informal) A person of a particular type specified by an adjective.

a whole different animal

no such animal

Bislama: anamol

Tok Pisin: animal

→ Esperanto: animalo

→ Ido: animalo

→ Volapük: nim

From Middle English animal, from Old French animal, from Latin animal, a nominal use of an adjective from animale, neuter of animālis, from anima (“breath, spirit”). Displaced native Middle English deor, der (“animal”) (whence modern English deer; from Old English dēor (“animal”)), Middle English reother (“animal, neat”) (whence modern English rother; from Old English hrīþer, hrȳþer (“neat, ox”)).


animal

Coordinate term: vegetal

animal instincts

The season has been most unfavourable to animal life; and I, who am merely animal, have suffered much by it.

1783 June 3, William Cowper, “To the Rev. William Bull”, in Private Correspondence of William Cowper, Esq. with Several of His Most Intimate Friends. […], volume I, London: […] Henry Colburn, […], and Simpkin and Marshall, […], published 1824, page 266:

[…]—according to Sanssure, Abbé Fortis, Bruckenman, Jameson, Dr. Richardson, &c. &c. both animal and vegetal remains have been detected in Basalt and Wacke.

1809, William Martin, Outlines of an Attempt to Establish a Knowledge of Extraneous Fossils, on Scientific Principles. […], Macclesfield, Cheshire: […] J. Wilson. Sold by the Author, […]; J. White, […], and Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, […], page 141:

The body was covered with soft hair, and though undoubtedly human, it was very animal in its instincts and ways.

1890, [Lena,] Lady Login, “Lucknow”, in Sir John Login and Duleep Singh, London: W. H. Allen & Co., […], page 78:

The unsatisfactory material at our command, however, renders it difficult to determine why we cannot prove a worship of a living incarnation for every deity who is represented on the monuments in a form either wholly or partially animal. We must wonder why, for example, the sacred hawk or hawks of Horus at Edfu (who never has human form) are scarcely mentioned.

1918, W[ilhelm] Max Müller, “[Egyptian Mythology] Worship of Animals and Men”, in Louis Herbert Gray, George Foot Moore, editors, The Mythology of All Races […], volume XII (Egyptian; Indo-Chinese), Boston, Mass.: Marshall Jones Company, page 167:

He looked down at the tangled wet hair, the wild, bare, animal shoulders.

1913–1921, D[avid] H[erbert] Lawrence, “The Horse Dealer’s Daughter”, in England My England and Other Stories, New York, N.Y.: Thomas Seltzer, published 24 October 1922, →OCLC, page 243:

I thought: if pain is the thing shared by all living creatures, then I’m no longer human or animal or vegetal; I am unplugged from the tick of metabolism; I am mineral.

2012, Jeet Thayil, Narcopolis, New York, N.Y.: The Penguin Press, →ISBN, page 216:

In any case, the argument the inhabitants of these parts would have advanced as their strongest one against the so-called chastity belt would, of course, have been that living species, whether animal or vegetative, were made the way they were for an obvious reason.

2015 August, Joseph M. Luguya, “Part 1: The Demented Scholar”, in Humans: The Untold Story of Adam and Eve and their Descendants, volume one (The Thesis), Silver Spring, Md.: Original Books, →ISBN, page 46:

animal passions

To explain what activated the flesh, ‘animal spirits’ were posited, superfine fluids which shuttled between the mind and the vitals, conveying messages and motion.

2003, Roy Porter, Flesh in the Age of Reason, Penguin, published 2004, page 47:

Pertaining to the spirit or soul; relating to sensation or innervation.

Wiktionary appendix of terms relating to animals

From Middle English animal, from Latin animālis, from either anima (“breath, spirit”) or animus. Originally distinct from the noun, it became associated with attributive use of the noun and is now indistinguishable from it.