Ox
[ɒks] or [ɑks]
Definition
(noun.) any of various wild bovines especially of the genera Bos or closely related Bibos.
(noun.) an adult castrated bull of the genus Bos; especially Bos taurus.
Checked by Abby--From WordNet
Definition
(n.) The male of bovine quadrupeds, especially the domestic animal when castrated and grown to its full size, or nearly so. The word is also applied, as a general name, to any species of bovine animals, male and female.
Checked by Anita
Definition
n. a well-known animal that chews the cud the female of which supplies the chief part of the milk used as human food: the male of the cow esp. when castrated:—pl. Ox′en used for both male and female.—ns. Ox′-bot Ox′-war′bler a bot-fly or its larva found under the skin of cattle; Ox′eye a common plant in meadows with a flower like the eye of an ox.—adj. Ox′-eyed having large full ox-like eyes.—ns. Ox′-goad (see Goad); Ox′-peck′er Ox′-bird an African bird which eats the parasites infesting the skins of cattle—also Beefeater; Ox′-tail-soup a kind of soup made of several ingredients one of which is an oxtail cut in joints.—Have the black ox tread on one's foot to experience sorrow or misfortune.
Checked by Annabelle
Unserious Contents or Definition
To see a well-fed ox, signifies that you will become a leading person in your community, and receive much adulation from women. To see fat oxen in green pastures, signifies fortune, and your rise to positions beyond your expectations. If they are lean, your fortune will dwindle, and your friends will fall away from you. If you see oxen well-matched and yoked, it betokens a happy and wealthy marriage, or that you are already joined to your true mate. To see a dead ox, is a sign of bereavement. If they are drinking from a clear pond, or stream, you will possess some long-desired estate, perhaps it will be in the form of a lovely and devoted woman. If a woman she will win the embraces of her lover. See Cattle.
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Examples
- The price of an ox, reckoned at ten guineas, is about three score times the price of a lamb, reckoned at 3s. Adam Smith. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.
- Gerald likes the man ploughing the best, his trousers are torn, he is ploughing with an ox, being I suppose a German peasant. D. H. Lawrence. Women in Love .
- The great ox, or aurochs, is now extinct, but it survived in the German forests up to the time of the Roman Empire. H. G. Wells. The Outline of History_Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind.
- Is not the dominant and masterful power of the lion or the eagle related to a carniverous diet, and the mild and placid temper of the ox the reflex expression of his vegetable food? Edward W. Byrn. The Progress of Invention in the Nineteenth Century.
- Trifling variations in the ingredients, in the proportion and in the heating, made it either pliable as kid, tougher than ox hide, as elastic as whalebone, or as rigid as flint. Edward W. Byrn. The Progress of Invention in the Nineteenth Century.
- He loves the idol he serves, and prays day and night that his frenzy may be fed, and that the Ox-eyed may smile on her votary. Charlotte Bronte. Shirley.
- The Friar bared his brawny arm up to the elbow, and putting his full strength to the blow, gave the Knight a buffet that might have felled an ox. Walter Scott. Ivanhoe.
- When used in the field they were dragged about by many yokes of oxen. William Henry Doolittle. Inventions in the Century.
- They had generally made their escape with a team or two, sometimes a yoke of oxen with a mule or a horse in the lead. Ulysses S. Grant. Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant.
- For ordinary draught purposes, as in the quotation from the _Iliad_ we have just made, oxen were employed. H. G. Wells. The Outline of History_Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind.
- Ten yokes of oxen dragging a boat with sails out of the sea in the morning with the line of the small waves breaking on the beach. Hemingway, Ernest. For Whom The Bell Tolls.
- But what did thee besides watch oxen? Hemingway, Ernest. For Whom The Bell Tolls.
- He made his way through the State of New York in wagons drawn by oxen to the remote and primitive township of Bayfield, in Upper Canada, on Lake Huron. Frank Lewis Dyer. Edison, His Life and Inventions.
- These primitive waggons were drawn by oxen. H. G. Wells. The Outline of History_Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind.
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