cattle
Americannoun
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bovine animals, especially domesticated members of the genus Bos.
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Bible. such animals together with other domesticated quadrupeds, as horses, swine, etc.
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Disparaging. human beings, especially in a large, unruly crowd.
noun
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bovid mammals of the tribe Bovini (bovines), esp those of the genus Bos
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Also called: domestic cattle. any domesticated bovine mammals, esp those of the species Bos taurus (domestic ox)
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of cattle
1175–1225; Middle English catel < Old North French: (personal) property < Medieval Latin capitāle wealth; see capital 1
Explanation
Use the word cattle to talk about a group of cows. A farmer might build a new fence to keep her cattle more safely secured in their pasture. Cattle usually refers to domesticated cows, almost always a large group of them. If you have a small dairy farm with only three or four cows, you'll probably call them "cows." When you're talking about a bigger operation, they're more likely to be called cattle. In the 13th century, the word simply meant "property," from the Medieval Latin capitale, "property or stock." It took about 300 years before cattle meant "cows."
Vocabulary lists containing cattle
African History - Introductory
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"The Americans: Reconstruction to the 21st Century," Vocabulary from Chapter 5
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African History - Middle School and High School
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
It is essential for cattlemen in the western plains who have for years been shrinking their cattle herds in response to droughts.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jul. 11, 2026
About 30 miles from Clint McRae’s southeastern Montana ranch, a local utility company bought roughly 6,000 acres of cattle grazing land.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jul. 11, 2026
Thomas Heitkamp and the team that discovered Gus - named after the late Gary "Gus" Licking, a cattle rancher whose land it was found on - spent three years carefully excavating.
From BBC • Jul. 11, 2026
So as part of National Lottery grant funding the team has secured solar-panelled collars for the cows to create a "no-fence grazing" perimeter to stop the cattle from leaving the land.
From BBC • Jul. 10, 2026
The hay we were cutting was to feed the cattle through the winter when they couldn’t get out to pasture.
From "The Teacher’s Funeral" by Richard Peck
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
