cattle
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: enpr: kăt'l
ipa: /ˈkætəl/
ipa: [ˈkʰæt(ə)ɫ]
ipa: [ˈkʰæɾ(ə)ɫ]
rhymes: -ætəl
Forms: form: cattle
Etymology: From Middle English catel, from Anglo-Norman catel (“personal property”), from Old Northern French (compare French cheptel, Old French chetel, chatel, also English chattel) from Medieval Latin capitāle, from Latin capitālis (“of the head”) (whence also capital, from caput (“head”) + -alis (“-al”)). For the sense evolution, compare pecuniary and fee. Also compare Russian поголо́вье (pogolóvʹje, “total number of livestock”) from Russian голова́ (golová, “head”). Doublet of capital and chattel.
Senses: examples: text: Many cattle were suffering from a disease called BSE.
glosses: Domesticated animal of the species Bos taurus (cows, bulls, steers, oxen etc), and other hoofed mammals of the genus Bos.
examples: text: Mr. Jos had hired a pair of horses for his open carriage, with which cattle, and the smart London vehicle, he made a very tolerable figure in the drives about Brussels.
ref: 1848, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 29, in Vanity Fair, page 246:
text: The Dover mail was in its usual genial position that the guard suspected the passengers, the passengers suspected one another and the guard, they all suspected everybody else, and the coachman was sure of nothing but the horses; as to which cattle he could with a clear conscience have taken his oath on the two Testaments that they were not fit for the journey.
ref: 1859, Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities, Book the First, chapter 2:
text: Mangcorn is utilized partly as human food, and partly as fodder for cattle, especially for fattening swine, for which purpose it is considered peculiarly adapted.
ref: 1923, Norwegian Trade Review, numbers 6-8, page 39:
glosses: Certain other livestock, such as sheep, pigs or goats. Also rarely applied to horses.
examples: text: "I always knew it, but I always denied it, because I'm one of them, and I'm like them." ¶"We're just cattle," the Prison Governor said, relieved now.
ref: 1961, Gerald Hanley, The Journey Homeward, page 155:
glosses: People who resemble domesticated bovine animals in behavior or destiny.
examples: text: goods and cattle
text: That then every person so offending and convict, shall for his third offence, forfeit to our Sovereign Lady the Queen, all his goods and cattles, and shall suffer imprisonment during his life.
ref: 1552, Parliament of England, An Act for the Uniformity of Common Prayer, and Service in the Church, and Administration of the Sacraments:
text: 1684 July. Mistris Dorothy Gray, Adminnestratrix of the Goods and Cattles of Mr Edward Gray, late of Plymouth, deceased, […]
ref: 1684, Records of the Colony of New Plymouth, in New England, published 1856:
topics: law
qualifier: plural cattles
glosses: chattel
examples: text: The temptation of a lone white man was too great for any gathering of myall-natives, and sheep-fat and cattle-steak seemed there for the spearing, so that a stockman always ran the risk of attack, especially if his shepherds interfered with the native women.
ref: a. 1964, Stephen Henry Roberts, The Squatting Age in Australia, 1835-1847, Melbourne University Press, published 1964, page 315:
text: “But you cooked a human being and ate him,” say I.
“I couldn’t help it,” says she. “I remember the cattle steaks of the old days, the juicy pork, the dripping joints of lamb, the venison.”
ref: a. 1978, Barry Hannah, “Eating Wife and Friends”, in Airships, Grove Press, published 1994, →ISBN, page 137:
text: Believe it or not Big Mac is one of the ultra radicals who provide fast food cattle burgers to interstate vehicles who drive all over the place providing scraps for rats, cats, flies, etc, so that the Mad Cow Disease might spread even faster than it would otherwise do.
ref: 1996 April 3, Emmett Jordan, “Re: AR activist arrested for spreading 'Mad Cow' disease in US”, in rec.food.veg (Usenet):
text: If a particular whale species isn't endangered, then there's not a blind bit of difference between butchering them or cattle.
ref: 2005 June 25, "Serge" (username), "Re: WOW!!!! WHALE BURGERS...... McDonalds Don't You Get Any Ideas", in aus.politics and other newsgroups, Usenet
roman: Whale burgers. Cattle burgers......no difference!
glosses: Used in restricted contexts to refer to the meat derived from cattle.
Synonyms: sense: domesticated bovine animals
word: beef
topics: scientific
sciences
sense: domesticated bovine animals
word: Bos
sense: domesticated bovine animals
word: bovine
sense: domesticated bovine animals
word: cattlebeast
sense: domesticated bovine animals
word: cattlehead
sense: domesticated bovine animals
word: neat
sense: domesticated bovine animals
word: kine
sense: people who resemble domesticated bovine animals in behavior or destiny
word: sheeple
Derived terms: all hat and no cattle
ant cattle
anticattle
Australian cattle dog
black cattle
catalo
cattabu
cattalo
cattelo
cattlebeast
cattle beast
cattle-buyer
cattle cake
cattle-cake
cattle call
cattle car
cattle catcher
cattle chamois
cattle class
cattle crush
cattle dock
cattle dog
cattledom
cattle drive
cattle-drive
cattle driver
cattle drover
cattle egret
cattle fair
cattle goad
cattle grid
cattle grub
cattle guard
cattleguard
cattle-guard
cattlehead
cattleheart
cattleless
cattle-like
cattlelike
cattlelog
cattleman
cattle market
cattle pad
cattleperson
cattle plague
cattlepost
cattle-prod
cattle prod
cattleproof
cattle ranch
cattle-rearing
cattleshed
cattle station
cattle tick
cattle truck
cattle trucked
cattle trucking
cattle wagon
cattlewealth
cattlewoman
dairy cattle
fed cattle
feeder cattle
gods may do what cattle may not
Heck cattle
Highland cattle
kittle cattle
noncattle
Texas cattle fever
western cattle egret
yattle
Related terms: word: capital
word: chattel
sense: Other entries associated with cattle
word: Angus
sense: Other entries associated with cattle
word: Bos taurus
sense: Other entries associated with cattle
word: bovine
sense: Other entries associated with cattle
word: bull
sense: Other entries associated with cattle
word: calf
sense: Other entries associated with cattle
word: cow
sense: Other entries associated with cattle
word: herd
sense: Other entries associated with cattle
word: ox
sense: Other entries associated with cattle
word: steer