oyster
Contents
EnglishEdit
Alternative formsEdit
EtymologyEdit
From Old English ostre, reinforced or superseded in Middle English by Anglo-Norman oistre, which from Old French oistre, uistre (compare modern French huître); both lines (Old English and Old French) from Latin ostrea, from Ancient Greek ὄστρεον (óstreon).
PronunciationEdit
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /ˈɔɪ.stə(ɹ)/
- (General American) IPA(key): /ˈɔɪ.stɚ/
- Rhymes: -ɔɪstə(ɹ)
Audio (US) (file)
NounEdit
oyster (plural oysters)
- Any of certain marine bivalve mollusks, especially those of the family Ostreidae (the true oysters), usually found adhering to rocks or other fixed objects in shallow water along the seacoasts, or in brackish water in the mouth of rivers.
- 1597-8, William Shakespeare, “Act II, Scene II”, in The Merry Wives of Windsor:
- Why, then the world's mine oyster
- 1731, Jonathan Swift, Polite Conversation, 1841, The Works of Jonathan Swift, Volume 2, page 344,
- He was a bold man that first ate an oyster.
- The delicate morsel of dark meat contained in a small cavity of the bone on each side of the lower part of the back of a fowl.
- A pale beige color tinted with grey or pink, like that of an oyster.
- oyster colour:
- (colloquial, by analogy) A person who keeps secrets.
- (Britain, slang) A shoplifter.
Derived termsEdit
Terms derived from oyster
TranslationsEdit
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food
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colour
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person who keeps secrets
AdjectiveEdit
oyster (comparative more oyster, superlative most oyster)
- Of a pale beige colour tinted with grey or pink, like that of an oyster.
VerbEdit
oyster (third-person singular simple present oysters, present participle oystering, simple past and past participle oystered)
- (intransitive) To fish for oysters.