Crossword clues for lapwing
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Lapwing \Lap"wing`\, n. [OE. lapwynke, leepwynke, AS. hle['a]pewince; hle['a]pan to leap, jump + (prob.) a word akin to AS. wincian to wink, E. wink, AS. wancol wavering; cf. G. wanken to stagger, waver. See Leap, and Wink.] (Zo["o]l.) A small European bird of the Plover family ( Vanellus cristatus, or Vanellus vanellus). It has long and broad wings, and is noted for its rapid, irregular fight, upwards, downwards, and in circles. Its back is coppery or greenish bronze. Its eggs are the ``plover's eggs'' of the London market, esteemed a delicacy. It is called also peewit, dastard plover, and wype. The gray lapwing is the Squatarola cinerea.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Middle English lappewinke (late 14c.), lapwyngis (early 15c.), folk etymology alteration of Old English hleapewince, probably literally "leaper-winker," from hleapan "to leap" + wince "totter, waver, move rapidly," related to wincian "to wink." Said to be so called from "the manner of its flight" [OED] "in reference to its irregular flapping manner of flight" [Barnhart], but the lapwing also flaps on the ground pretending to have a broken wing to lure egg-hunters away from its nest, which seems a more logical explanation. Its Greek name was polyplagktos "luring on deceitfully."
Wiktionary
n. 1 Any of several medium-sized wade birds belonging to the subfamily Vanellinae within family Charadriidae. 2 A silly man.
WordNet
n. large crested Old World plover having wattles and spurs [syn: green plover, peewit, pewit]
Wikipedia
Vanellinae are any of various crested plovers, family Charadriidae, noted for its slow, irregular wingbeat in flight and a shrill, wailing cry. Its length is 10–16 inches. They are a subfamily of medium-sized wading birds which also includes the plovers and dotterels. The Vanellinae are collectively called lapwings but also contain the ancient red-kneed dotterel. A lapwing can be thought of as a larger plover.
The traditional terms "plover", "lapwing" and "dotterel" were coined long before modern understandings of the relationships between different groups of birds emerged: in consequence, several of the Vanellinae are still often called "plovers", and the reverse also applies, albeit more rarely, to some Charadriinae (the "true" plovers and dotterels).
In Europe, "lapwing" often refers specifically to the northern lapwing, the only member of this group to occur in most of the continent.
A lapwing is a medium-sized wading bird belonging to the family Charadriidae.
Lapwing may also refer to:
- Lapwing class minesweeper, a mine warfare class
- Lapwing Publications, a publisher based in Belfast
- USS Lapwing (AM-1), a Lapwing-class minesweeper
- USS Lapwing (AMS-48), a YMS-1-class minesweeper
- HMS Lapwing, one of a number of Royal Navy ships named after the bird.
- Lapwing (1787 sloop) - a sloop that Granville Sharp purchased in 1790 for the support of a colony of free blacks he tried to establish in Sierra Leone
- Lapwing (EIC packet ship) - three vessels served the British East India Company as packet ships between 1743 and 1773.
Three ships named Lapwing have served the British East India Company (EIC) as packet ships. Much smaller than the great East Indiamen, the primary role of the packets was to carry dispatches quickly back and forth between London and the company's headquarters in Bengal and on the Coromandel Coast. The packets also carried some cargo and passengers.
- Lapwing (1743 EIC packet) - a fast sailing packet launched in 1743 that made five voyages for the British East India Company (EIC) before she was condemned in 1751 as unfit for further service.
- Lapwing (1762 EIC packet) - a packet ship launched in 1762 that made two round-trip voyages to India for the EIC before the EIC sold her in Bengal in 1765 when she arrived there on her third voyage.
- Lapwing (1769 EIC packet) - a packet ship of obscure origin and fate that made two round-trip voyages to India for the ECI between 1769 and 1773.
Category:Ships of the British East India Company Category:Age of Sail merchant ships
Usage examples of "lapwing".
You take the blood of a lapwing and with it anoint the pulses of the forehead before going to rest.
Did not the very lapwing, as she tumbled, softly wailing, before him, as she did years ago, seem to welcome the wanderer home in the name of heaven?
Last time he wrote it was on Craig-Ellachie paper: this time, like the wanton lapwing, he had got himself another crest.
Hudson gives in his master-work on La Plata the most interesting description, which must be read in the original, of complicated dances, performed by quite a number of birds: rails, jacanas, lapwings, and so on.
Larks were singing high up in the blue, and wailing lapwings skimmed the fallows.
But when he standeth on his somewhat long legs, and thou seest that his under parts be white, why, even a Frenchman would know he was no pigeon, but must be the peewit or lapwing.
To seek a profound and true theological dogma in such a statement is as absurd as to seek it in the classic myth that the lapwing with his sharp beak chases the swallow because he is the descendant of the enraged Tereus who pursued poor Progne with a drawn sword.
Larks were singing high up in the blue, and wailing lapwings skimmed the fallows.
But when he standeth on his somewhat long legs, and thou seest that his under parts be white, why, even a Frenchman would know he was no pigeon, but must be the peewit or lapwing.
The false lapwing: full of stratagems and pretences to divert approaching danger from the nest where her young ones are.
And there was the chibis, a Russian word for lapwing bird, another idea borrowed from the Soviets: reinforced leggings that reduced the air pressure over the legs, to make the heart work harder to pull blood up from the lower body.
Of such therefore as are bred in our land, we have the crane, the bitter,the wild and tame swan, the bustard, the heron, curlew, snite, wildgoose, wind or doterell, brant, lark, plover (of both sorts), lapwing, teal, widgeon, mallard, sheldrake, shoveller, peewitt, seamew, barnacle, quail (who, only with man, are subject to the falling sickness), the knot, the oliet or olive, the dunbird, woodcock, partridge, and pheasant, besides divers others, whose names to me are utterly unknown, and much more the taste of their flesh, wherewith I was never acquainted.
Lapwing warned Shrike that the Regians planned to send a strong force into the hills.