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gazelle

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
See also: Gazelle

English

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Gazella bennettii

Alternative forms

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Etymology

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Unadapted borrowing from Middle French gazelle, from Old French gazel, from Arabic غَزَال (ḡazāl).

Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): /ɡəˈzɛl/
  • Audio (UK):(file)
  • Rhymes: -ɛl

Noun

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gazelle (plural gazelles or gazelle)

  1. An antelope of either of the genera Gazella (mostly native to Africa), Procapra (native to Asia), Eudorcas, or Nanger, capable of running at high speeds for long periods.

Derived terms

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Translations

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Verb

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gazelle (third-person singular simple present gazelles, present participle gazelling, simple past and past participle gazelled)

  1. (intransitive, figurative) To leap like a gazelle.
    • 1917, Marion Hill, chapter 2, in McAllister’s Grove‎[1], page 21:
      And all of the pine trees were in a bad state of repair, owning charred stumps of arms and blasted heads. Quite a number of them were dead; some of the corpses leaned starkly back in the arms of a live brother, but most of them preferred to fall across the road. Owing to this the car was soon gazelling again.
    • 1982, J. G. Ballard, “Memories of the Space Age”, in Memories of the Space Age‎[2], Sauk City, WI: Arkham House, published 1988, page 151:
      The biplane gazelled into the air.
    • 2014, Bob McDonald, Canadian Spacewalkers: Hadfield, MacLean and Williams Remember the Ultimate High Adventure, page 172:
      When I started off [spacewalking] I didn’t run straight away—I started at a fairly fast walk, three or four miles an hour—but by the end I was jogging, well, gazelling, at almost six miles an hour.
  2. (intransitive, figurative) To go fast; to speed; to rush.
    • 1990, Kim Stanley Robinson, Pacific Edge, page 90:
      Nadezhda and I biked over together, me dressed in colonial whites, trundling along with other cyclists gazelling by me on both sides […]
    • 2017, Eddie Mair, A Good Face for Radio: Confessions of a Radio Head‎[3], pages 10-11:
      I actually heard the air move as about five people gazelled towards Lord Mandelson to try to stop another of his ill-timed leaks.

References

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Dutch

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Etymology

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Unadapted borrowing from French gazelle.

Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): /ˌɣaːˈzɛ.lə/
  • Audio:(file)
  • Hyphenation: ga‧zel‧le

Noun

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gazelle f (plural gazellen, diminutive gazelletje n)

  1. gazelle, mammal of the tribe Antilopini

French

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Etymology

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    Borrowed from Arabic غَزَال (ḡazāl).

    Pronunciation

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    Noun

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    gazelle f (plural gazelles)

    1. gazelle

    Further reading

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    Anagrams

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