egg

English

/ɛɡ/, /eɪɡ/

noun
Definitions
  • (zoology) An approximately spherical or ellipsoidal body produced by birds, reptiles, insects and other animals, housing the embryo during its development.
  • (countable) The egg of a domestic fowl (especially a hen) or its contents, used as food.
  • (biology) The female primary cell, the ovum.
  • Anything shaped like an egg, such as an Easter egg or a chocolate egg.
  • A swelling on one's head, usually large or noticeable, associated with an injury.
  • (slang) A Caucasian who behaves as if they were (East) Asian (from being "white" outside and "yellow" inside).
  • (NZ) A foolish or obnoxious person.
  • (informal) A person, fellow.
  • (LGBT) A person who is regarded as having not yet realized they are transgender, has not yet come out, or is in the early stages of transitioning.
  • (computing) One of the blocks of data injected into a program's address space for use by certain forms of shellcode, such as "omelettes".

Etymology

Inherited from Middle English egge (edge, egg) derived from Old Norse egg (egg, edge) derived from Proto-Germanic *ajją (egg) derived from Proto-Indo-European *h₂ōwyóm (egg).

Origin

Proto-Indo-European

*h₂ōwyóm

Gloss

egg

Concept
Semantic Field

Food and drink

Ontological Category

Classifier

Kanji

Emoji
🍳 🐓 🐔 🐣 🐤

Timeline

Distribution of cognates by language

Geogrpahic distribution of cognates

Cognates and derived terms