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 consonant noun

a basic speech sound in which the breath is at least partly obstructed and which can be combined with a vowel to form a syllable. Contrasted with vowel . • a letter representing a consonant.
(From The Oxford Dictionary of English (2nd edition revised) in English Dictionaries & Thesauruses)
 
 
 
 
 vowel noun
a speech sound which is produced by comparatively open configuration of the vocal tract, with vibration of the vocal cords but without audible friction, and which is a unit of the sound system of a language that forms the nucleus of a syllable. ...
(From The Oxford Dictionary of English (2nd edition revised) in English Dictionaries & Thesauruses)
 
 
 
 
 
 
 diphthong noun
a sound formed by the combination of two vowels in a single syllable, in which the sound begins as one vowel and moves towards another (as in coin , loud , and side ). Often contrasted with monophthong , triphthong . • a digraph representing the sound ...
(From The Oxford Dictionary of English (2nd edition revised) in English Dictionaries & Thesauruses)
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Oxford English Dictionary
 
 
 
kestrel: ({sm}k{ope}str{shti}l)

    1. A species of small hawk (Falco tinnunculus, or Tinnunculus alaudarius), also called stannel or windhover, remarkable for its habit of sustaining itself in the same place in the air with its head to the wind. The name is extended to about 15 foreign species of the restricted genus Tinnunculus.

 
 

philology, n. Brit. /f{shtibar}{sm}l{rfa}l{schwa}d{zh}i/, U.S. /f{schwa}{sm}l{fata}l{schwa}d{zh}i/ 

 

    1. Love of learning and literature; the branch of knowledge that deals with the historical, linguistic, interpretative, and critical aspects of literature; literary or classical scholarship. Now chiefly U.S.
  By the late 19th cent. this general sense had become rare, but it was revived, principally in the United States, in the early 20th cent. For a fuller discussion of this, see A. Morpurgo Davies Hist. Linguistics (1998) 4 I. 22.

  {dag}2. Chiefly depreciative. Love of talk or argument. Obs.

    3. The branch of knowledge that deals with the structure, historical development, and relationships of languages or language families; the historical study of the phonology and morphology of languages; historical linguistics. See also comparative philology at COMPARATIVE adj. 1b.
  This sense has never been current in the United States, and is increasingly rare in British use. Linguistics is now the more usual term for the study of the structure of language, and (often with qualifying adjective, as historical, comparative, etc.) has generally replaced philology

 
 
  crow, n (kr{schwa}{shtu}) 

[OE. cráwe f., corresp. to OS. krâia, MLG. krâge, krâe, krâ, LG. kraie, kreie, MDu. kraeye, Du. kraai, OHG. chrâwa, chrâja, chrâ, crâwa, crâ, MHG. kræe, krâwe, krâ, Ger. krähe; a WG. deriv. of the vb. crâwan, crâian to CROW, q.v.] 

    1. a. A bird of the genus Corvus; in England commonly applied to the Carrion Crow (Corvus Corone), ‘a large black bird that feeds upon the carcasses of beasts’ (Johnson); in the north of England, Scotland, and Ireland to the Rook, C. frugilegus; in U.S. to a closely allied gregarious species, C. americanus.

    b. fig.

    2. With qualifications, as hooded, Kentish, or Royston crow, Corvus Cornix; red-legged crow, C. Graculus; fish crow of America, C. ossifragus or C. caurinus; CARRION-CROW, etc.; also applied to birds outside the genus or family, as mire crow, sea crow, names for Larus ridibundus; scare crow, the Black Tern (Hydrochelidon nigra); blue crow, a crow-like jay of N. America, Gymnocitta cyanocephala; piping crows, the birds of the sub-family Gymnorhininæ or Streperinæ; and others.

    3. a. In phrases and proverbial sayings, as as black as a crow, the crow thinks its own bird fairest (or white), etc. a white crow: i.e. a rara avis. to eat (boiled) crow (U.S. colloq.): to be forced to do something extremely disagreeable and humiliating.

    b. to have a crow to pluck or pull (rarely pick) with any one: to have something disagreeable or awkward to settle with him; to have a matter of dispute, or something requiring explanation, to clear up; to have some fault to find with him. Formerly also, to pluck or pull a crow with one or together.

    c. as the crow flies, etc.: in a direct line, without any of the détours caused by following the road.

    d. Colloq. phr. stone (or stiffen) the crows: an exclamation of surprise or disgust. Esp. Austral.

    4. Astron. To southern constellation Corvus, the Raven.

    5. a. A bar of iron usually with one end slightly bent and sharpened to a beak, used as a lever or prise; a CROW-BAR.

    b. Used as an agricultural tool.

    {dag}6. A grappling hook, a grapnel. Obs. [Cf. CORVY, F. corbeau.]

    {dag}7. An ancient kind of door-knocker. Obs. [med.L. cornix, Erasmus Colloq., Puerpera.]

    8. a. Thieves' slang. One who keeps watch while another steals.

    b. N.Z., colloq. A person who pitches sheaves to the stacker.

    c. slang. A derogatory name for a girl or woman, esp. one who is old or ugly; freq. in phr. old crow.

    {dag}9. Alch. A colour of ore, or of substances in a certain state. Obs.

    10. Mining. Used attrib. to denote a poor or impure bed of coal, limestone, etc.; e.g. in crow bed, chert, coal, lime(stone. (Cf. crow-gold in 11.) north. and Sc.

    11. Comb., as crow-scaring; crow-like adj. and adv.; crow-bait colloq. (orig. U.S.) = crows'-meat; spec. an old or worn-out horse; {dag}crow-bird, a young crow; crow-blackbird (U.S.), a name for the Purple Grackle (Quiscalus purpureus), and allied species; crow-boy, a boy employed to scare crows away; crow-coal (see 10 above); crow-corn, a name for the North American plant Aletris farinosa; {dag}crow-cup = CROW-STONE; crow-eater (Australian colloq.), ‘a lazy fellow who will live on anything rather than work’ (Lentzner); also, a South Australian; crow-fig, the berry of the nux vomica tree; crow-flight, -fly, a direct course, a straight line (cf. sense 3c); also quasi-adv.; crow-gold (see quot.); crow-herd, a person employed to guard corn-fields from rooks; crow-hole, a hole made with an iron crow; crow-iron, a crow-bar; {dag}crow-keeper = crow-herd; also a scare-crow; crow-line, the straight line of a crow's flight; crows'-meat, food for crows, carrion; crow-minder = crow-herd; crow-needle, the Umbelliferous plant Scandix Pecten; crow-net, a net for catching crows and other birds; crowpeck(s, {dag}-pickes (see quots.); crow-pheasant, a large bird of India and China, Centropus sinensis; crow-pick v. trans., to inspect (coal) and free it from stones and rubbish; hence crow-picker; crow-purse, a local name for the empty egg-case of the skate (also Mermaid's-purse); crow-sheaf (Cornwall), ‘the top sheaf on the end of a mow’; crow-shrike, a bird of the sub-family Gymnorhininæ or Piping Crows; {dag}crow-spike, a crow-bar; crow-starving, the keeping of rooks from cornfields; crow-tree, a tree in a rookery. See also CROW-BAR to CROW-TREAD.

 

 

 

 

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