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• cat's eye
  cat's eye

  noun

  any of certain gems having a chatoyant luster, especially chrysoberyl.
• cat's-eye
  cat's-eye

  noun

  any of a group of gemstones, esp a greenish-yellow variety of chrysoberyl, that reflect a streak of light when cut in a rounded unfaceted shape

cat's eye

American  

[kats-ahy] / ˈkætsˌaɪ /

Or cat's-eye

noun

• cat's eyes,
  plural
• cat's-eyes
  plural

1. any of certain gems having a chatoyant luster, especially chrysoberyl.

2. a playing marble marked with eyelike concentric circles.

3. cat eye.

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cat's-eye British  

noun

1. any of a group of gemstones, esp a greenish-yellow variety of chrysoberyl, that reflect a streak of light when cut in a rounded unfaceted shape

2. Also called: ataata.  a grazing marine gastropod, Turbo smaragdus , of New Zealand waters

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• cat's eyes
  plural
• cat's-eyes
  plural

Etymology

Origin of cat's eye

First recorded in 1545–55

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

cat's eye cat's-eye cat's-eyes

Those who know fashion recognize this as the cat's eye.

From Salon ● Oct. 27, 2024

Light enters the eye through the cornea, the round, transparent surface of the cat’s eye.

From National Geographic ● Jan. 2, 2024

The bright, sweetish, clear liqueur is the color of a cat’s eye, and it hits the tongue like a fairy spell, otherworldly and arcane, floral, grassy and herbaceously vibrant.

From Seattle Times ● Apr. 6, 2022

In Baldwin’s book, the story is positioned at cat’s eye level, a little like the perspective in a Tom and Jerry cartoon.

From The Guardian ● Jun. 25, 2019

From around the maid’s aproned skirts there appeared a single cat’s eye, a sickening yellow.

From "Secrets at Sea" by Richard Peck

“We always say there’s a lot of movies in this movie,” offers Gordon, who has blunt Betty Page bangs and eyeliner that flicks up at the corners in a delicate cat’s-eye.

From Washington Post ● Jun. 21, 2017

A woman in cat’s-eye glasses and straight dark hair sat on another woman’s lap; the woman with glasses turned out to be one-half of a married heterosexual couple from Westchester.

From New York Times ● May 11, 2017

Hyman, who was on leave to finish writing her book on Renaissance erotic poetry, wore bright-red cat’s-eye glasses and matching lipstick.

From The New Yorker ● May 23, 2016

“CatCam” is no more a cat’s-eye view of life than “Tokyo Waka” is a rendering of the world from a bird’s eye, but, together, they remind us that the human-animal relationship is a two-way street.

From New York Times ● Aug. 27, 2013

Huge green eyes glared at me behind a pair of cat’s-eye glasses.

From "P.S. I Miss You" by Jen Petro-Roy

Never before has there been such a phantasmagoria of shapes, sizes, colors and prices: python, polka-dotted and zebra frames, champagne, vermilion and espresso-colored lenses, asymmetric cat's-eyes and jewelry-bedizened sun helmets that cost thousands of dollars.

From Time Magazine Archive

We had them all: cat’s-eyes, aggies, dearies, milkies, steelies, glassies, onionskins.

From Full of Beans by Jennifer L. Holm

"These cat's-eyes," she said, "you will wear, and think of me and the judge who presents them."

From The Jimmyjohn Boss and Other Stories by Wister, Owen

They were Pecos cat's-eyes, he told me, obtained in the rocky canyons of that stream, and destined to be worth little until fashion turned from foreign jewels to become aware of these fine native stones.

From The Jimmyjohn Boss and Other Stories by Wister, Owen

And she refastened a bracelet with great care—which contained two cat's-eyes of no value—as she went on her way.

From The Damsel and the Sage A Woman's Whimsies by Glyn, Elinor