TORTOISE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does tortoise mean? 

• TORTOISE (noun)
  The noun TORTOISE has 1 sense:

1. usually herbivorous land turtles having clawed elephant-like limbs; worldwide in arid area except Australia and Antarctica

  Familiarity information: TORTOISE used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• TORTOISE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Usually herbivorous land turtles having clawed elephant-like limbs; worldwide in arid area except Australia and Antarctica

Classified under:

Nouns denoting animals

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

turtle (any of various aquatic and land reptiles having a bony shell and flipper-like limbs for swimming)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "tortoise"):

European tortoise; Testudo graeca (small land tortoise of southern Europe)

giant tortoise (very large tortoises of the Galapagos and Seychelles islands)

gopher; gopher tortoise; gopher turtle; Gopherus polypemus (burrowing edible land tortoise of southeastern North America)

desert tortoise; Gopherus agassizii (burrowing tortoise of the arid western United States and northern Mexico; may be reclassified as a member of genus Xerobates)

Texas tortoise (close relative to the desert tortoise; may be reclassified as a member of genus Xerobates)

Holonyms ("tortoise" is a member of...):

family Testudinidae; Testudinidae (land tortoises)

 Context examples 

The tale of the tortoise and the hare is being retold.

(Race across the tundra: White spruce vs. snowshoe hare, National Science Foundation)

I heard a noise just over my head, like the clapping of wings, and then began to perceive the woful condition I was in; that some eagle had got the ring of my box in his beak, with an intent to let it fall on a rock, like a tortoise in a shell, and then pick out my body, and devour it: for the sagacity and smell of this bird enables him to discover his quarry at a great distance, though better concealed than I could be within a two-inch board.

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

He waved his hand for silence, and went on:—Can you tell me why the tortoise lives more long than generations of men; why the elephant goes on and on till he have seen dynasties; and why the parrot never die only of bite of cat or dog or other complaint?

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)