SALAMANDER • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Salamander

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/sˌæləmˈændər/ Listen

noun

Salamander n.

(Zool.) Any one of numerous species of Urodela, belonging to Salamandra, Amblystoma, Plethodon, and various allied genera, especially those that are more or less terrestrial in their habits. Note: The salamanders have, like lizards, an elongated body, four feet, and a long tail, but are destitute of scales. They are true Amphibia, related to the frogs. Formerly, it was a superstition that the salamander could live in fire without harm, and even extinguish it by the natural coldness of its body. "I have maintained that salamander of yours with fire any time this two and thirty years." "Whereas it is commonly said that a salamander extinguisheth fire, we have found by experience that on hot coals, it dieth immediately."

(Zool.) The pouched gopher (Geomys tuza) of the Southern United States.

A culinary utensil of metal with a plate or disk which is heated, and held over pastry, etc., to brown it.

A large poker. (Prov. Eng.)

(Metal.) Solidified material in a furnace hearth.

Giant salamander. (Zool.) See under Giant.

Salamander's hair or Salamander's wool (Min.), a species of asbestos or mineral flax. (Obs.)

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Etymology of 'Salamander'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Salamander" Quotes from Famous Books

... memory. But it was to cloud life no longer—only to stand as a sign of warning, a danger-signal. Surely the net is spread in vain in the sight of any bird. The burned child dreads the fire. He did not as yet reckon that man is a moral Salamander, and accommodates himself to all temperatures of heat and asceticism. How should a raw lad of less than nineteen think in such a fashion? But he knew what he had not known; he had passed through the fire, and the smell of burning ...

— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray

... of our Salamanders is very similar to that of the frogs and toads. The eggs hatch out into tadpoles, then legs are developed, but the tail is not absorbed. Unlike the frogs and toads, the Salamander keeps its tail throughout life, and in some kinds of Salamanders which spend all of their time in the water, the gills are used throughout life. Salamanders have various common names, some being called newts, others ...

— Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts • Girl Scouts

... regrowth. When, however, we descend to the lower vertebrate classes, which are generally looked at as representing the higher classes in their embryonic condition, we find ample powers of regrowth. Spallanzani[35] cut off the legs and tail of a salamander six times, and Bonnet eight times, successively, and they were reproduced. An additional digit beyond the proper number was occasionally formed after Bonnet had cut off or had divided longitudinally the hand or foot, and ...

— The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Volume II (of 2) • Charles Darwin

... common viands, and I find they agree with my stomach as well as theirs. I could digest a salad gathered in a churchyard as well as in a garden. I cannot start at the presence of a serpent, scorpion, lizard, or salamander: at the sight of a toad or viper I find in me no desire to take up a stone to destroy them. I feel not in myself those common antipathies that I can discover in others; those national repugnances ...

— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various

... will be hotter at two or three. But the mornings and evenings are delicious. I am shedding my clothes by degrees; stockings are unbearable. Meanwhile my cough is almost gone, and the pain is quite gone. I feel much stronger, too; the horrible feeling of exhaustion has left me; I suppose I must have salamander blood in my body to be made lively by such heat. Sally is quite well; she does not seem at ...

— Letters from Egypt • Lucie Duff Gordon

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