animal

• (UK, US) enPR: ăn'ĭməl, IPA^(key): /ˈæn.ɪ.məl/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• (weak vowel merger) IPA^(key): /ˈæn.ə.məl/

Picture dictionary
animal
organism organism
mammal mammal fish fish amphibian amphibian reptile reptile bird bird insect insect

From Middle English animal, from Old French animal, from Latin animal, a nominal use of an adjective from animale, neuter of animālis, from anima (“breath, spirit”). Displaced native Middle English deor, der (“animal”) (from Old English dēor (“animal”)), Middle English reother (“animal, neat”) (from Old English hrīþer, hrȳþer (“neat, ox”)).

animal (plural animals)

1. (sciences) Any eukaryote of the clade Animalia; a multicellular organism that is usually mobile, whose cells are not encased in a rigid cell wall (distinguishing it from plants and fungi) and which derives energy solely from the consumption of other organisms (distinguishing it from plants).

   Synonym: creature

   Hyponyms: human, person

   Humans, like other animals, need air to breathe and food to eat.

   • 1650, Thomas Browne, “Of the Cameleon”, in Pseudodoxia Epidemica: […], 2nd edition, London: […] A[braham] Miller, for Edw[ard] Dod and Nath[aniel] Ekins, […], →OCLC, 3rd book, page 133:

     It cannot be denied it [the chameleon] is (if not the moſt of any) a very abſtemious animall, and ſuch as by reaſon of its frigidity, paucity of bloud, and latitancy in the winter (about which time the obſervations are often made) will long ſubſist without a viſible ſuſtentation.

2. (loosely) Any member of the kingdom Animalia other than a human.

   Synonym: beast

   Coordinate terms: human, person

3. (loosely) A higher animal; an animal related to humans.

   When he's hungry my toddler opens his mouth like an animal instead of asking us to feed him.

   1. (colloquial) A tetrapod; a land-dwelling nonhuman vertebrate.
      • 2013 July-August, Henry Petroski, “Geothermal Energy”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 4:

        Ancient nomads, wishing to ward off the evening chill and enjoy a meal around a campfire, had to collect wood and then spend time and effort coaxing the heat of friction out from between sticks to kindle a flame. With more settled people, animals were harnessed to capstans or caged in treadmills to turn grist into meal.

   2. A warm-blooded animal; a mammal or bird.
   3. A non-human mammal.

      I spent my summer studying the animals and birds of the two islands.

4. (figuratively) A person who behaves wildly; a bestial, brutal, brutish, cruel, or inhuman person.

   Synonyms: brute, monster, savage

   My students are animals.

   • 2019, “Bad Guy”, Finneas O'Connell, Billie Eilish O'Connell (lyrics), performed by Billie Eilish:

     Own me, I'll let you play the role
     I'll be your animal

5. (informal) A person of a particular type specified by an adjective.

   He's a political animal.

6. Matter, thing.

   a whole different animal

   no such animal

• See also Thesaurus:animal

From Middle English animal, from Latin animālis, from either anima (“breath, spirit”) or animus. Originally distinct from the noun, it became associated with attributive use of the noun and is now indistinguishable from it.

animal (not comparable)

1. (Should we delete⁽⁺⁾ this sense?) Of or relating to animals.

   Synonyms: beastly, bestial

   Coordinate term: vegetal

   animal instincts

   • 1783 June 3, William Cowper, “To the Rev. William Bull”, in Private Correspondence of William Cowper, Esq. with Several of His Most Intimate Friends. […], volume I, London: […] Henry Colburn, […], and Simpkin and Marshall, […], published 1824, page 266:

     The season has been most unfavourable to animal life; and I, who am merely animal, have suffered much by it.

   • 1809, William Martin, Outlines of an Attempt to Establish a Knowledge of Extraneous Fossils, on Scientific Principles. […], Macclesfield, Cheshire: […] J. Wilson. Sold by the Author, […]; J. White, […], and Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, […], page 141:

     […]—according to Sanssure, Abbé Fortis, Bruckenman, Jameson, Dr. Richardson, &c. &c. both animal and vegetal remains have been detected in Basalt and Wacke.

   • 1890, [Lena,] Lady Login, “Lucknow”, in Sir John Login and Duleep Singh, London: W. H. Allen & Co., […], page 78:

     The body was covered with soft hair, and though undoubtedly human, it was very animal in its instincts and ways.

   • 1918, W[ilhelm] Max Müller, “[Egyptian Mythology] Worship of Animals and Men”, in Louis Herbert Gray, George Foot Moore, editors, The Mythology of All Races […], volume XII (Egyptian; Indo-Chinese), Boston, Mass.: Marshall Jones Company, page 167:

     The unsatisfactory material at our command, however, renders it difficult to determine why we cannot prove a worship of a living incarnation for every deity who is represented on the monuments in a form either wholly or partially animal. We must wonder why, for example, the sacred hawk or hawks of Horus at Edfu (who never has human form) are scarcely mentioned.

   • 1913–1921, D[avid] H[erbert] Lawrence, “The Horse Dealer’s Daughter”, in England My England and Other Stories, New York, N.Y.: Thomas Seltzer, published 24 October 1922, →OCLC, page 243:

     He looked down at the tangled wet hair, the wild, bare, animal shoulders.

   • 2012, Jeet Thayil, Narcopolis, New York, N.Y.: The Penguin Press, →ISBN, page 216:

     I thought: if pain is the thing shared by all living creatures, then I’m no longer human or animal or vegetal; I am unplugged from the tick of metabolism; I am mineral.

   • 2015 August, Joseph M. Luguya, “Part 1: The Demented Scholar”, in Humans: The Untold Story of Adam and Eve and their Descendants, volume one (The Thesis), Silver Spring, Md.: Original Books, →ISBN, page 46:

     In any case, the argument the inhabitants of these parts would have advanced as their strongest one against the so-called chastity belt would, of course, have been that living species, whether animal or vegetative, were made the way they were for an obvious reason.

2. Raw, base, unhindered by social codes.

   Synonyms: animalistic, beastly, bestial, untamed, wild

   animal passions

3. Pertaining to the spirit or soul; relating to sensation or innervation.
   • 2003, Roy Porter, Flesh in the Age of Reason, Penguin, published 2004, page 47:

     To explain what activated the flesh, ‘animal spirits’ were posited, superfine fluids which shuttled between the mind and the vitals, conveying messages and motion.

4. (slang, Ireland) Excellent.

• Wiktionary appendix of terms relating to animals

• “animal”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• animal in Keywords for Today: A 21st Century Vocabulary, edited by The Keywords Project, Colin MacCabe, Holly Yanacek, 2018.
• “animal”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• animal in Britannica Dictionary
• animal in Ozdic collocation dictionary
• animal in WordReference English Collocations

• Alamin, Almain, Malian, Manila, Milana, al-Amin, almain, aminal, lamina, maalin, manila

Borrowed from Latin animal.

• IPA^(key): /aniˈmal/, [a.niˈmal]
• Rhymes: -al
• Hyphenation: a‧ni‧mal

animal (epicene, plural animales)

1. animal

animal m (plural animales)

1. animal

Borrowed from Latin animal.

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic) [ə.niˈmal]
• IPA^(key): (Valencian) [a.niˈmal]

• Audio (Valencian)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -al
• Hyphenation: a‧ni‧mal

animal m or f (masculine and feminine plural animals)

1. animal

animal m (plural animals)

1. animal

• animalada
• animalitzar (“to animalize”)

• “animal” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
• “animal”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2024
• “animal” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
• “animal” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.

Borrowed from Spanish animal, from Latin animal, a nominal use of an adjective from animale, neuter of animālis, from anima (“breath, spirit”).

• IPA^(key): /ʔaniˈmal/, [ʔʌ.n̪ɪˈmal̪]
• Hyphenation: a‧ni‧mal

animál

1. animal
2. (derogatory) rascal

   Synonym: banyaga

3. (sometimes humurous) a crazy person

animál

1. (sometimes humorous) crazy
2. contemptible, deserving contempt
3. ruthless; without pity or compassion; cruel, pitiless

animál

1. (vulgar) used as an expression of disgust, anger, etc.

Borrowed from Latin animal. Compare the archaic inherited doublet aumaille and its variant armaille, both from the Latin neuter plural animālia.

• IPA^(key): /a.ni.mal/

• (un animal)

  (file)

• Audio

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• Homophones: animale, animales

animal m (plural animaux)

1. animal

   Synonyms: bête, bestiole

animal (feminine animale, masculine plural animaux, feminine plural animales)

1. animal

   Synonym: bestial

   Antonym: végétal

• “animal”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

• lamina

Learned borrowing from Latin animal.

• IPA^(key): /aniˈmal/ [a.nĩˈmɑɫ]
• Rhymes: -al
• Hyphenation: a‧ni‧mal

animal m or f (plural animais)

1. animal

animal m (plural animais)

1. animal

From French animal, from Latin animal.

• IPA^(key): /a.ni.mal/

animal

1. animal

   Synonym: zannimo

Borrowed from Spanish animal.

• IPA^(key): /ʔaniˈmal/, [ʔɐ.niˈmal]
• Hyphenation: a‧ni‧mal

animál

1. animal

   Synonym: ayup

• IPA^(key): /a.niˈmal/

animal (plural animales)

1. animal

From Portuguese animal.

animal

1. beast
2. animal

Borrowed from Spanish animal.

• IPA^(key): /ənɪˈmal/, [ə.nɪˈmäl]
• Hyphenation: a‧ni‧mal

animal

1. animal

   Synonym: ayup

From animāle, nominative neuter singular of animālis.

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈa.ni.mal/, [ˈänɪmäɫ̪]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈa.ni.mal/, [ˈäːnimäl]

animal n (genitive animālis); third declension

1. animal
2. living creature

Third-declension noun (neuter, “pure” i-stem).

• bestia

• “animal”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “animal”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• animal in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
• animal in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• Carl Meißner, Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book‎, London: Macmillan and Co.
  • animate and inanimate nature: animata (animalia) inanimaque (not inanimata)
    
  • domestic animals: animalia quae nobiscum degunt (Plin. 8. 40)
    

• IPA^(key): /aniˈmaːl/, /aˈnimal/

Borrowed from Old French animal, from Latin animal.

• animale

animal (plural animales)

1. An animal (considered to include humans)

• English: animal (see there for further descendants)
• Scots: ainimal

• “animāl, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2019-01-16.

Borrowed from Latin animālis.

• animale, animall, anymal, anymall

animal

1. Related to the soul or spirit of a living being (i.e. sentience or sapience)

• English: animal

• “animāl, adj.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2019-01-16.

animal m (plural animaux or animaulx)

1. animal

   Synonym: beste

From Portuguese animal and Spanish animal.

animal

1. beast
2. animal

Learned borrowing from Latin animal. Doublet of alimária.

• Rhymes: (Portugal) -al, (Brazil) -aw
• Hyphenation: a‧ni‧mal

animal m or f (plural animais, comparable, comparative mais animal, superlative o mais animal or animalíssimo)

1. (biology) animal (relating to animals)
   • 2000, Julio S. Inglez de Sousa et al., Enciclopédia agrícola brasileira: E-H, Editora da Universidade de São Paulo, page 225:

     Em anatomia animal o termo é de uso muito comum, […]

     The term is very commonly used in animal anatomy, […]

2. (derogatory, of a person) brute (senseless, unreasoning)
   • For quotations using this term, see Citations:animal.
3. (Brazil, colloquial) cool; awesome
   • 2015, Juliana Rosenthal K., Save the Day, Buqui, page 52:

     É, tava animal mesmo — Bia mal consegue falar.

     Yeah, it really was wild — Bia can barely speak.

animal m (plural animais)

1. (biology) animal (any member of the kingdom Animalia)
   • 2020, Petrônio Braz, Léxico dos Gerais, Chiado Books, page 481:

     Primatas — Animais mamíferos, da ordem Primata, que compreende os macacos, antropóides e o homem.

     Primates — Mammalian animals, of the order Primata, which comprises monkeys/apes, anthropoids and man.

2. (non-scientific usage) animal (an animal other than a human, especially a vertebrate)
   • 2007, Daniela Ikawa, Valor humano intrínseco e redistribuição social in 2007, Flávia Piovesan, Daniela Ikawa, Direitos Humanos: Fundamento, Proteção e Implementação, volume 2, Juruá Editora, page 44:

     Separar os dois grupos — humanos e animais requereria, dentro dos limites da teoria relativa à dor e ao sofrimento, […]

     Separating the two groups — humans and animals would require, within the limits of the theory relating to pain and suffering, […]

   Synonyms: besta, bicho

3. (colloquial) twat; idiot; moron
   • 1979, Wilson Bacelar de Oliveira, Os meus fantasmas, Editora Comunicação, page 490:

     Escute aqui, seu animal, então você brigou com o companheiro?

     Listen up, you dumbass, so you fought with [your] mate?

   Synonyms: idiota, retardado, burro, imbecil, débil mental, besta

4. (colloquial) beast (a cruel person)
   • 2007, Creso Balduíno, O verso do ser, Editora Revan, page 170:

     Josuel é um animal repulsivo, uma besta humana.

     Josuel is a repulsive beast, a human beast.

   Synonym: monstro

• анимал (animal) — post-1930s Cyrillic spelling

Borrowed from French animal, from Latin animal. Doublet of nămaie.

• IPA^(key): /a.niˈmal/

• Audio (female voice):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -al
• Hyphenation: a‧ni‧mal

animal m or n (feminine singular animală, masculine plural animali, feminine and neuter plural animale)

1. animal, animalistic
2. brutal

animal

1. brutally

animal n (plural animale)

1. animal

Borrowed from Latin animal.

animal m (plural animals)

1. (Rumantsch Grischun, Sursilvan, Sutsilvan, Surmiran, Vallader) animal

• (Rumantsch Grischun, Sursilvan, Surmiran) biestg
• (Rumantsch Grischun, Sutsilvan) bestga
• (Sursilvan) tier, bestia
• (Puter, Vallader) bes-cha

Borrowed from Latin animal. See also alimaña, an inherited doublet.

• IPA^(key): /aniˈmal/ [a.niˈmal]
• (Castilian)

  Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -al
• Syllabification: a‧ni‧mal

animal m or f (masculine and feminine plural animales)

1. animal

animal m (plural animales)

1. animal

• “animal”, in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014

• lámina
• lamina

Borrowed from Spanish animal, from Latin animal.

• (Standard Tagalog) IPA^(key): /ʔaniˈmal/ [ʔɐ.nɪˈmal]
• Rhymes: -al
• Syllabification: a‧ni‧mal

animál (Baybayin spelling ᜀᜈᜒᜋᜎ᜔)

1. beast; brute; creature

   Synonyms: halimaw, hayop

2. (derogatory) brutish person; inhuman person

   Synonyms: hayop, bruto, bestiya

From English animal.

animal

1. animal (any member of the kingdom Animalia that is not a human)

   Synonym: abus

   • 1989, Buk Baibel long Tok Pisin, Port Moresby: Bible Society of Papua New Guinea, Jenesis 1:25:

     God i kamapim ol kain kain animal bilong ples na ol bikpela na liklik animal bilong bus. God i lukim olgeta dispela samting i gutpela, na em i amamas.

     →New International Version translation