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estray

[ih-strey]
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noun
  1. a person or animal that has strayed.
  2. Law. a domestic animal, as a horse or a sheep, found wandering or without an owner.
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verb (used without object)
  1. Archaic. to stray.
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Origin of estray

1250–1300; Middle English astrai < Anglo-French estray, derivative of Old French estraier to stray
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018

Examples from the Web for estray

Historical Examples

  • That would mean, that a lost horse had been killed or an estray steer.

    The Sleuth of St. James's Square

    Melville Davisson Post

  • A man can always recognize his estray, and when she is recognized she will come to heel.

    The Branding Iron

    Katharine Newlin Burt

  • But such an estray, such a piece of flotsam, was Audrey, that she could not help him out.

    Audrey

    Mary Johnston

  • She desired to convert some one, to recover some estray, to reform some wretch.

  • Supposing him to have belonged to the old Count's stud of foreign horses, we led him back as an estray.

British Dictionary definitions for estray

estray

noun
  1. law a stray domestic animal of unknown ownership
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Word Origin

C16: from Anglo-French, from Old French estraier to stray
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012