• Butterfly

    Pronunciation

    Origin

    Middle English buterflie, butturflye, boterflye, from Old English butorflēoge, buttorflēoge, buterflēoge, perhaps a compound of butor- 'beater', mutation of bēatan 'to beat', and flēoge 'fly'.

    Donald A. Ringe, A Linguistic History of English: From Proto-Indo-European to Proto-Germanic (Oxford: Oxford, 2003), 232.

    More at beat and fly.

    Alternate etymology connects the first element to butere ("butter"), as the name may have originally been applied solely to butterflies of a yellowish color. This may have merged later with the belief that butterflies ate milk and butter (compare Middle High German molkendiep ("butterfly", literally milk-thief); Modern German Molkendieb and Low German Botterlicker ("butterfly", literally butter-licker)), or that they excreted a butter-like substance (compare Middle Dutch boterschijte ("butterfly", literally butter-shitter)). Compare also Middle Dutch botervliege ("butterfly") (Dutch botervlieg), German Butterfliege ("butterfly"). More at butter, fly.

    Full definition of butterfly

    Noun

    butterfly

    (plural butterflies)
    1. A flying insect of the order Lepidoptera, distinguished from moths by their diurnal activity and generally brighter colouring. from 11th c.
    2. (now rare) Someone seen as being unserious and (originally) dressed gaudily; someone flighty and unreliable. from 17th c.
      • 1897, Henry James, What Maisie Knew:The day came indeed when her breathless auditors learnt from her in bewilderment that what ailed him was that he was, alas, simply not serious. Maisie wept on Mrs. Wix's bosom after hearing that Sir Claude was a butterfly ....
    3. The butterfly stroke. from 20th c.
    4. A use of surgical tape, cut into thin strips and placed across an open wound to hold it closed.butterfly tape

    Synonyms

    Derived terms

    Verb

    1. To cut almost entirely in half and spread the halves apart, in a shape suggesting the wings of a butterfly.butterflied shrimpButterfly the chicken before you grill it.
    2. To cut strips of surgical tape or plasters into thin strips, and place across a gaping wound to close it.

    Anagrams

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