Library / English Dictionary

KITTEN

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Young domestic cat

Synonyms:

kitten; kitty

Classified under:

Nouns denoting animals

Hypernyms ("kitten" is a kind of...):

young mammal (any immature mammal)

Derivation:

kitten (give birth to kittens)

 II. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Give birth to kittens

Example:

our cat kittened again this year

Classified under:

Verbs of grooming, dressing and bodily care

Hypernyms (to "kitten" is one way to...):

bear; birth; deliver; give birth; have (cause to be born)

Sentence frame:

Something ----s

Derivation:

kitten (young domestic cat)

Credits

 Context examples: 

Even the offer of a kitten or even a full-grown cat will not tempt him.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

He took me up in his right fore-foot and held me as a nurse does a child she is going to suckle, just as I have seen the same sort of creature do with a kitten in Europe; and when I offered to struggle he squeezed me so hard, that I thought it more prudent to submit.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

For she knew that in the lynx's lair was a litter of kittens, and she knew the lynx for a fierce, bad-tempered creature and a terrible fighter.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

Beth mourned as for a departed kitten, and Meg refused to defend her pet.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

It was a terrible blow; but he did not seem to mind it, but seized him also, and struggled with the three of us, pulling us to and fro as if we were kittens.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

He knew only that the velvet- furred kitten was meat, and he ate and waxed happier with every mouthful.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

"Hannah left it on the kitchen table a minute, and the kittens got at it. I'm very sorry, Amy," added Beth, who was still a patroness of cats.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

I was not unprepared for this request, for I had noticed how his pets went on increasing in size and vivacity, but I did not care that his pretty family of tame sparrows should be wiped out in the same manner as the flies and the spiders; so I said I would see about it, and asked him if he would not rather have a cat than a kitten.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

It was all very well for half a dozen wolves to drive a lynx, spitting and bristling, up a tree; but it was quite a different matter for a lone wolf to encounter a lynx—especially when the lynx was known to have a litter of hungry kittens at her back.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

Beth, if you don't keep these horrid cats down cellar I'll have them drowned, exclaimed Meg angrily as she tried to get rid of the kitten which had scrambled up her back and stuck like a burr just out of reach.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)