corpse

CEFRC1

/kɔːps/

noun · verb

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    noun

    A dead human body.

  2. 02

    noun

    Extra detail

    A human body in general, whether living or dead.

Examples

  • Hisao's face was as pale as that of a corpse.

  • This thing is not a bear. It is the corpse of a bear.

At a glance

Sits at C1 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
2
Citations
5
Synonyms
5

Also pronounced

  • [kʰo̞ɹps]
  • /koɹps/

Deep Dive

noun

Extra meanings
  1. The dead body of any animal with flesh; the dead body of a vertebrate; a carcass.

  2. A dead body, especially that of a human as opposed to an animal.

verb

Extra meaning
  1. To laugh uncontrollably during a performance.

More examples

In context
  • Cantharidin, although readily decomposed by chemical agents, is so permanent in the body that it has been detected in the corpse of a cat eighty-four days after death.

  • I saw battle-corpses, myriads of them, / And the white skeletons of young men, I saw them, / I saw the debris and debris of all the slain soldiers of the war, […]

  • Nelson and I landed next to the half rotted corpse of a horse full of maggots.

Quick test

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Nearby

Origin

noun

From Middle English, from earlier corse, from Old French cors, from Latin corpus (“body”). Displaced native English likam and lich. The ⟨p⟩ was inserted due to the original Latin spelling. Doublet of corps and corpus, and distantly of riff (via Proto-Indo-European). The verb sense derives from the notion of being unable to control laughter while acting as dead body.