Kilkenny cats
Americanplural noun
Etymology
Origin of Kilkenny cats
First recorded in 1815–25
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.
Efforts to get the Chamber's "Sacred Truce" into legal form set Deputies of all factions fighting like Kilkenny cats.
From Time Magazine Archive
With a 20-year tradition of amiable meetings, this time the American Society of Newspaper Editors wrangled like Kilkenny cats.
From Time Magazine Archive
Mad as Kilkenny cats, the farmers went ahead, felling trees across the road and cutting telephone and telegraph wires.
From Time Magazine Archive
Thus, somewhat after the fashion of Kilkenny cats, perished two tyrants of the sea.
From The Ocean Waifs A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea by Reid, Mayne
Several contestants urged inoculating other grasses, such as bamboo, with the Metamorphizer, expecting the two giants of vegetation, like the Kilkenny cats, would end by devouring each other.
From Greener Than You Think by Moore, Ward
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.
