OWL • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Owl

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noun

Owl n.

(Zool.) Any species of raptorial birds of the family Strigidae. They have large eyes and ears, and a conspicuous circle of feathers around each eye. They are mostly nocturnal in their habits. Note: Some species have erectile tufts of feathers on the head. The feathers are soft and somewhat downy. The species are numerous. See Barn owl, Burrowing owl, Eared owl, Hawk owl, Horned owl, Screech owl, Snowy owl, under Barn, Burrowing, etc. Note: In the Scriptures the owl is commonly associated with desolation; poets and story-tellers introduce it as a bird of ill omen.... The Greeks and Romans made it the emblem of wisdom, and sacred to Minerva, and indeed its large head and solemn eyes give it an air of wisdom.

(Zool.) A variety of the domestic pigeon.

Owl monkey (Zool.), any one of several species of South American nocturnal monkeys of the genus Nyctipithecus. They have very large eyes. Called also durukuli.

Owl moth (Zool.), a very large moth (Erebus strix). The expanse of its wings is over ten inches.

Owl parrot (Zool.), the kakapo.

Sea owl (Zool.), the lumpfish.

Owl train, a cant name for certain railway trains whose run is in the nighttime.

verb

Owl v. i. (past & past part. owled; pres. part. owling)

To pry about; to prowl. (Prov. Eng.)

To carry wool or sheep out of England. (Obs.) Note: This was formerly illegal, and was done chiefly by night.

Hence, to carry on any contraband trade. (Eng.)

See images of 'Owl'

Etymology of 'Owl'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Owl" Quotes from Famous Books

... half uprooted elm overhanging the creek, until the world grew worshipfully still as it does twenty miles from a railroad; their quiet, contented thoughts undisturbed by the call of the whippoorwills in the near thickets and the hooting of a great owl far down the valley. ...

— Chit-Chat; Nirvana; The Searchlight • Mathew Joseph Holt

... hamlet, there was a boy of this name, who tended sheep on the hill sides. His father was a hard working farmer, who every year tried to coax to grow out of the stony ground some oats, barley, leeks and cabbage. In summer, he worked hard, from the first croak of the raven to the last hoot of the owl, to provide food for his wife and baby daughter. When his boy was born, he took him to the church to be christened Gruffyd, but every body called him "Gruff." In time several little sisters came to ...

— Welsh Fairy Tales • William Elliot Griffis

... the silence, except the faint murmur which now and then the trees will make in the quietest night, as if they were dreaming, and talked in their sleep; for the motion does not seem to pass beyond them, but to swell up and die again in the heart of them. This and the occasional cry of an owl was all that broke the silent flow of the undivided moments,—glacier-like flowing none can tell how. We seldom spoke, and at length the house within seemed possessed by the silence from without; but we were all ear,—one hungry ear, ...

— The Vicar's Daughter • George MacDonald

... of the house-tops you'll see her, In form of a vampire; 'tis then you must flee her; A crow of ill-omen she often is roaming, Or else as an owl that flits ...

— Operas Every Child Should Know - Descriptions of the Text and Music of Some of the Most Famous Masterpieces • Mary Schell Hoke Bacon

... minutes back comes Anthony, solemn as an owl. 'Major,' said he, 'I done did all I c'u'd, an' dere ain't no way 'cept breakin' down de do'. Las' time I done dat, Mis' Slocomb neber forgib me ...

— A Gentleman Vagabond and Some Others • F. Hopkinson Smith

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