cattle
Part of speech: noun
Morphological type: simple
Topics: law
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.
Inflected forms:
form: cattle
pos: noun
tags: singular
Senses:
gloss: Domesticated animal of the species Bos taurus (cows, bulls, steers, oxen etc), and other hoofed mammals of the genus Bos.
pos: noun
tags: plural
plural-normally
examples: Many cattle were suffering from a disease called BSE.
gloss: Certain other livestock, such as sheep, pigs or goats. Also rarely applied to horses.
pos: noun
tags: plural
plural-normally
examples: 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.
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.
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.
gloss: People who resemble domesticated bovine animals in behavior or destiny.
pos: noun
tags: derogatory
figuratively
plural
plural-normally
examples: "Come, that will do," interrupted Joolby with an impatient growl; "talk, talk, talk—that's all it ever comes to with your kind of cattle. Do you still think that you are playing at charades, girl? […]"
"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.
gloss: chattel
pos: noun
tags: English
countable
obsolete
plural
plural-normally
sometimes
examples: goods and cattle
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.
1684 July. Mistris Dorothy Gray, Adminnestratrix of the Goods and Cattles of Mr Edward Gray, late of Plymouth, deceased, […]
gloss: Used in restricted contexts to refer to the meat derived from cattle.
pos: noun
tags: plural
plural-normally
rare
uncountable
examples: 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.
“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.”
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.
If a particular whale species isn't endangered, then there's not a blind bit of difference between butchering them or cattle.
Related words: capital
chattel
Angus
Bos taurus
bovine
bull
calf
cow
herd
ox
steer
Derived words: all hat and no cattle
ant cattle
anticattle
Australian cattle dog
black cattle
catalo
cattabu
cattalo
cattelo
cattle beast
cattlebeast
cattle-buyer
cattle cake
cattle-cake
cattle call
cattle car
cattle catcher
cattle chamois
cattle class
Cattle Creek
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
cattleguard
cattle-guard
cattle guard
cattlehead
cattleheart
cattleless
cattle-like
cattlelike
cattlelog
cattleman
cattle market
cattle pad
cattle pen
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
goycattle
Heck cattle
Highland cattle
kittle cattle
noncattle
Texas cattle fever
western cattle egret
Wild Cattle Creek
yattle
Translations: