swine
Americannoun
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swine,
plural
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swines
plural
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any stout, cloven-hoofed artiodactyl of the Old World family Suidae, having a thick hide sparsely covered with coarse hair, a disklike snout, and an often short, tasseled tail: now of worldwide distribution and hunted or raised for its meat and other products.
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the domestic hog, Sus scrofa.
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a coarse, gross, or brutishly sensual person.
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a contemptible person.
noun
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a coarse or contemptible person
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another name for a pig
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of swine
before 900; Middle English; Old English swīn; cognate with German Schwein hog, Latin suīnus (adj.) porcine; akin to sow 2
Explanation
A swine is a pig or a big ol’ nasty hog. Swine have short legs, thick bodies, and they eat just about anything. If someone acts like a pig, call him a swine. Although it’s old fashioned, the word swine comes in handy if you need another word for hog, like if you’re really into writing poems about pigs. Swine — which is also the plural form, like fish — are common farm animals. Some are eaten as bacon, some are kept as pets. Swine themselves are omnivorous, so they'll eat meat, vegetables, or, well, garbage.
Vocabulary lists containing swine
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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.
See Examples For:
After seeing the tiny swine around noon Saturday, he pulled out his phone and started recording while giving chase.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 18, 2026
Babirusas in the wild are found on just four Indonesian islands and the zoo said they were being wiped out due to African swine fever reaching the islands five years ago.
From BBC ● Aug. 12, 2026
There have been nine such declarations, including the Ebola outbreak in 2013, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the swine flu pandemic in 2009.
From MarketWatch ● May 17, 2026
A herd of pigs at a swine facility once charged at him, forcing him to jump out of the way while the farmhands chuckled.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 7, 2026
Then, to keep at a distance dogs or men, he took a sharpened lance, and went to rest under a hollow rock where swine were sleeping out of the w ind and rain.
From "The Odyssey" by Homer
Human respiratory physiology is more like that of swines than felines.
From Salon ● Feb. 12, 2025
Another manager on the brink is Quique Sànchez Flores, reportedly set to be sacked by the ungrateful swines at Watford, with a first top-ten finish in 30 years still on the table.
From The Guardian ● Apr. 30, 2016
This person professes himself to be of the Mahometan faith, and will not permit swines flesh to be eaten in his dominions.
The myth of Circe turning the companions of Ulysses into swines shows the religious belief, in ancient Greece, in magical transformation of human beings into animals.
From Greek Women by Mitchell Carroll
But 'e says, "None of yer jabber, ye swines; 'elp me inter my bunk, and two of yer bring me a 'ot linseed poultice for my chest."
From Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 152, March 28, 1917 by Various
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.
