lamb

CEFRA2

/ˈlæm/

noun · verb

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    noun

    A young sheep, especially one less than a year old.

  2. 02

    verb

    To give birth to a lamb.

Examples

  • Have you got any preference between beef and lamb?

  • This child is as gentle as a lamb today.

At a glance

Sits at A2 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
2
Citations
5
Synonyms
2

Also pronounced

  • /ˈleə̯m/

Deep Dive

noun

Extra meanings

  1. A young goat; a kid.

  2. The flesh of a lamb used as food; (sometimes loosely) the flesh of a sheep of any age used as food.

  3. A young sheep.

More examples

In context

  • Mary had a little lamb, its fleece as white as snow.

  • The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], 1611, →OCLC, Exodus 12:5: “Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year: ye shall take it out from the sheep, or from the goats:”

  • Near-synonym: sheep

Synonyms

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

The shepherd gently carried the soft woolly blank to its mother.

Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

Nearby

Origin

noun

From Middle English lamb, from Old English lamb, from Proto-West Germanic *lamb, from Proto-Germanic *lambaz, probably from Proto-Indo-European *h₁l̥h₁onbʰos, enlargement of *h₁elh₁én, ultimately from *h₁el-. See also Dutch lam, German Lamm, Bavarian Lamperl, Danish lam, Swedish lamm, Finnish lammas, Scottish Gaelic lon (“elk”), Ancient Greek ἔλαφος (élaphos, “red deer”). More at elk.