mollusc

British

/ ˈmɒləsk /

noun

any invertebrate of the phylum Mollusca, having a soft unsegmented body and often a shell, secreted by a fold of skin (the mantle). The group includes the gastropods (snails, slugs, etc), bivalves (clams, mussels, etc), and cephalopods (cuttlefish, octopuses, etc)

"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

Other Word Forms

Etymology

Origin of mollusc

C18: via New Latin from Latin molluscus, from mollis soft

Example Sentences

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See Examples For:

mollusc

"Beguiled by their cuteness," conservationist Ian Hughes has made it his "life-defining" mission to protect the threatened mollusc, which was once widespread in UK waters.

From BBC ● Sep. 11, 2026

Scientists photographed and filmed what looked like fields of marine life - dominated by various different types of tube worm and mollusc.

From BBC ● Jul. 30, 2025

Chemically speaking, its formation begins with a mollusc extracting calcium and carbonate ions from water.

From Science Daily ● Jan. 12, 2024

“And I’ve got to say,” she says, “a mollusc is a nice companion.”

From The Guardian ● Nov. 17, 2020

Multivalve, mul′ti-valv, n. a mollusc having a shell of more than two valves.—adj. having many valves—also Multival′vular.

From Chambers's Twentieth Century Dictionary (part 2 of 4: E-M) by Various

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023