reptile
[rep-til, -tahyl]
- any cold-blooded vertebrate of the class Reptilia, comprising the turtles, snakes, lizards, crocodilians, amphisbaenians, tuatara, and various extinct members including the dinosaurs.
- (loosely) any of various animals that crawl or creep.
- a groveling, mean, or despicable person.
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- of or resembling a reptile; creeping or crawling.
- groveling, mean, or despicable.
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Origin of reptile
1350–1400; Middle English reptil < Late Latin rēptile, noun use of neuter of rēptilis creeping, equivalent to Latin rēpt(us) (past participle of rēpere to creep) + -ilis -ile
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Related Words
cur, toad, coward, rascal, louse, slink, dastard, cheater, snake, informer, skunk, scoundrel, wretch, heel, weasel, reptileExamples from the Web for reptile
Contemporary Examples
A reptile hatching from an egg must not cry out for its mother, or else it will be readily detected by predators and eaten.
In 1915 Thorpe started also playing and coaching the “reptile sport” of professional football in Canton, Ohio.
Pedestrians would take turtles for walks and let the reptile set the pace.
Historical Examples
The Indians happily observed the reptile; and knowing what it indicated, awoke him.
The Life of Horatio Lord NelsonRobert Southey
Juno afterward restored the reptile's sight and hid it in a cave.
The Devil's DictionaryAmbrose Bierce
He had the crawl of the reptile,—he had, also, its poison and its fangs.
Leila, CompleteEdward Bulwer-Lytton
If nothing but its bones had been found it would have been called a reptile.
The Meaning of EvolutionSamuel Christian Schmucker
So the allantois of the reptile has become the placenta of the mammal.
The Meaning of EvolutionSamuel Christian Schmucker
reptile
- any of the cold-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Reptilia, characterized by lungs, an outer covering of horny scales or plates, and young produced in amniotic eggs. The class today includes the tortoises, turtles, snakes, lizards, and crocodiles; in Mesozoic times it was the dominant group, containing the dinosaurs and related forms
- a grovelling insignificant personyou miserable little reptile!
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- creeping, crawling, or squirming
- grovelling or insignificant; mean; contemptible
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Word Origin
C14: from Late Latin reptilis creeping, from Latin rēpere to crawl
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
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Word Origin and History for reptile
n.
late 14c., "creeping or crawling animal," from Old French reptile (early 14c.) and directly from Late Latin reptile, noun use of neuter of reptilis (adj.) "creping, crawling," from rept-, past participle stem of repere "to crawl, creep," from PIE root *rep- "to creep, crawl" (cf. Lithuanian replioju "to creep"). Used of persons of low character from 1749.
Precise scientific use began to develop mid-18c., but the word was used as well at first of animals now known as amphibians, including toads, frogs, salamanders; separation of Reptilia (1835 as a distinct class) and Amphibia took place early 19c.; popular use lagged, and reptile still was used late 18c. with sense "An animal that creeps upon many feet" [Johnson, who calls the scorpion a reptile], sometimes excluding serpents.
And the terrestrial animals may be divided into quadrupeds or beasts, reptiles, which have many feet, and serpents, which have no feet at all. [Locke, "Elements of Natural Philosophy," 1689]
An inadvertent step may crush the snail
That crawls at ev'ning in the public path ;
But he that has humanity, forewarn'd,
Will tread aside, and let the reptile live.
[Cowper, "The Task," 1785]
The Old English word for "reptile" was slincend, related to slink.
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
reptile
[rĕp′tīl′]
- Any of various cold-blooded vertebrates of the class Reptilia, having skin covered with scales or horny plates, breathing air with lungs, and usually having a three-chambered heart. Unlike amphibians, whose eggs are fertilized outside the female body, reptiles reproduce by eggs that are fertilized inside the female. Though once varied, widespread, and numerous, reptilian lineages, including the pterosaurs, ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs, and dinosaurs, have mostly become extinct (though birds are living descendants of dinosaurs). The earliest reptiles were the cotylosaurs (or stem reptiles) of the late Mississippian or early Pennsylvanian Period, from which mammals evolved. Modern reptiles include crocodiles, snakes, turtles, and lizards.
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The American Heritage® Science Dictionary
Copyright © 2011. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.