Contextualizebeta

mooncalf

noun
/ˈmuːnkɑːf/UK

Etymology

From moon + calf, after a superstition that the moon caused abnormal fetal development.

  1. inherited from *kalbaz✻
  2. inherited from *kalb✻
  3. inherited from cælf
  4. inherited from calf
  5. compounded as mooncalf — “moon + calf”

Definitions

  1. An abnormal mass within the uterus

    An abnormal mass within the uterus; a false conception.

    • Thou art very Trinculo indeed! How camest thou to be the siege of this moon-calf? Can he vent Trinculos?

  2. A poorly conceived idea or plan.

  3. A dreamer, someone absent-minded or distracted

    A dreamer, someone absent-minded or distracted; a fool, simpleton.

    • “[…] you’re a jobbernowl and a doodle, a maundering mooncalf and a blockheaded numps, a gaby and a loon; you’re a Hatter!” I shrieked the last epithet.
    • But I can think of no one but a mooncalf or a gaby Who would trust their own child to raise a baby.
    • He slipped it softly onto her unresisting finger and, like the unwise moncalf he was, kissed it.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for mooncalf. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA