estray
Americannoun
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a person or animal that has strayed.
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Law. a domestic animal, as a horse or a sheep, found wandering or without an owner.
verb (used without object)
noun
Etymology
Origin of estray
1250–1300; Middle English astrai < Anglo-French estray, derivative of Old French estraier to stray
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.
“Throughout the past year, we offered real solutions to the Forest Service for the Gila estray problem. Those solutions would address the immediate issue, provide long-term resolution and would be humane.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 22, 2023
The tune of "Anacreon in Heaven" has been objected to as "foreign"; but in truth it is an estray, and Key's and the American people's by adoption.
From The Star-Spangled Banner by John A. Carpenter
Calling upon some infantry men near by, who were also estray, he mounted one horse himself and directed them to mount the other horses, and together they took the piece to Centreville.
From The Rhode Island Artillery at the First Battle of Bull Run by J. Albert Monroe
And a health to the one away, Who drifts down careless Italy, God's wanderer and estray!
From Songs from Vagabondia by Richard Hovey
But such an estray, such a piece of flotsam, was Audrey, that she could not help him out.
From Audrey by Mary Johnston
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Get a wordDefinitions 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.
