mastodon
See also: Mastodon
English
editAlternative forms
editEtymology
editFirst attested 1813, from translingual Mastodon (1806), coined by French naturalist Georges Cuvier, from masto- (“breast”) + -odon (“tooth”), due to the mammilloid (“nipple-shaped”) projections on the crowns of the extinct mammal's molars.
Pronunciation
edit- (General American) IPA(key): /ˈmæstədɑn/, /ˈmæstədən/[1]
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /ˈmæs.tə.dɒn/[2]
Audio (Southern England): (file)
Noun
editmastodon (plural mastodons)
- Extinct elephant-like mammal of the genus †Mammut that flourished worldwide from Miocene through Pleistocene times; differs from elephants and mammoths in the form of the molar teeth.
- Synonym: (archaic) incognitum
- 2014, Elizabeth Kolbert, chapter 2, in The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History, Henry Holt and Company:
- When, exactly, Europeans first stumbled upon the bones of an American mastodon is unclear. An isolated molar unearthed in a field in upstate New York was sent off to London in 1705; it was labeled the “tooth of a Giant”.
- (figurative) Anything awkwardly large or unwieldy.
- 2017, Nina Laurin, Girl Last Seen:
- The battery is dying, and Natalia's iPhone charger doesn't fit my mastodon of a phone anyway.
- 2020, Finn Laursen, The Development of the EU as a Sea-Policy Actor:
- Nor does it work for governance: the policy has become such a mastodon that we can't adapt it quickly enough to different regions or different circumstances.
Derived terms
editRelated terms
editTranslations
editextinct elephant-like mammal of the genus Mammut
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References
edit- ^ “mastodon”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
- ^ “mastodon”, in Cambridge English Dictionary, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press, 1999–present, retrieved 04 May 2022.
Further reading
edit- mastodon on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
- Mammut on Wikispecies.Wikispecies
- Mammut on Wikimedia Commons.Wikimedia Commons
Categories:
- English terms derived from Translingual
- English coinages
- English terms prefixed with masto-
- English terms suffixed with -odon
- English 3-syllable words
- English terms with IPA pronunciation
- English terms with audio links
- English lemmas
- English nouns
- English countable nouns
- English terms with quotations
- en:Elephants