REPTILES

Noun

reptiles

plural of reptile

Anagrams

• epistler, peitrels, peltries, perlites, repliest, spirelet

Source: Wiktionary


REPTILE

Rep"tile (rp"tl;277), a. Etym: [F. reptile, L. reptilis, fr. repere, reptum, to creep; cf. Lith. reploti; perh. akin to L. serpere. Cf. Serpent.]

1. Creeping; moving on the belly, or by means of small and short legs.

2. Hence: Groveling; low; vulgar; as, a reptile race or crew; reptile vices. There is also a false, reptile prudence, the result not of caution, but of fear. Burke. And dislodge their reptile souls From the bodies and forms of men. Coleridge.

Rep"tile, n.

1. (Zoöl.)

Definition: An animal that crawls, or moves on its belly, as snakes,, or by means of small, short legs, as lizards, and the like. An inadvertent step may crush the snail That crawls at evening in the public path; But he that has humanity, forewarned, Will tread aside, and let the reptile live. Cowper.

2. (Zoöl.)

Definition: One of the Reptilia, or one of the Amphibia.

Note: The amphibians were formerly classed with Reptilia, and are still popularly called reptiles, though much more closely allied to the fishes.

3. A groveling or very mean person.

Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition



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Word of the Day

26 December 2024

CHATTEL

(noun) personal as opposed to real property; any tangible movable property (furniture or domestic animals or a car etc)


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Coffee Trivia

Some 16th-century Italian clergymen tried to ban coffee because they believed it to be “satanic.” However, Pope Clement VII loved coffee so much that he lifted the ban and had coffee baptized in 1600.

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