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butterfly

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

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WOTD – 23 January 2006,22 February 2006

Etymology

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A butterfly.
Abrimstone butterfly. The wordbutterfly may have its origins in the name of yellow (or cream-coloured) butterflies such as this.

FromMiddle Englishbuterflie,butturflye,boterflye, fromOld Englishbuterflēoge, equivalent tobutter +‎fly. Cognate withDutchbotervlieg,GermanButterfliege(“butterfly”). The name may have originally been applied to butterflies of a yellowish color, or reflected a belief that butterflies ate milk and butter (compareGermanMolkendieb(“butterfly”, literally“whey-thief”) andLow GermanBotterlicker(“butterfly”, literally“butter-licker”)), or that they excreted a butter-like substance (compareDutchboterschijte(“butterfly”, literally“butter-excretor”)). Compare alsoGermanSchmetterling fromSchmetten(“cream”),German Low GermanBottervögel(“butterfly”, literally“butter-fowl”). More atbutter,fly.

An alternate theory suggests that the first element may have originally been Old Englishbutor-(“beater”), a mutation ofbēatan(“to beat”),[1] but this would not explain the cognates in other languages or the other names formed with milk products.

Superseded non-nativeMiddle Englishpapilion(“butterfly”) borrowed fromOld Frenchpapillon(“butterfly”).

Pronunciation

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Noun

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butterfly (pluralbutterflies)

  2. A flyinginsect of theorderLepidoptera, distinguished from moths by theirdiurnal activity and generally brighter colouring.[from 11th c.]
    • a.1931 (date written),D[avid] H[erbert] Lawrence, “[Personalia and Fragments.] [Autobiographical Fragment].”, in Edward D[avid] McDonald, editor,Phoenix: The Posthumous Papers of D. H. Lawrence, London:William Heinemann, published1936,→OCLC,page836:
      It is true. I am like abutterfly, and I shall only live a little while.
  3. (medicine, attributive) A use of surgical tape, cut into thin strips and placed across an open wound to hold it closed.
    butterfly tape;butterfly bandage;butterfly strips
  5. (swimming) Thebutterfly stroke.[from 20th c.]
  6. Any of several plane curves that look like a butterfly; seeButterfly curve (transcendental) andButterfly curve (algebraic).
  7. (in theplural)Ellipsis ofbutterflies in one’s stomach(“A sensation of excited anxiety felt in the stomach”).
    I get terriblebutterflies before an exam.
  8. (now rare) Someone seen as beingunserious and (originally)dressedgaudily; someoneflighty andunreliable.[from 17th c.]
    • 1859, George Meredith, chapter 15, inThe Ordeal of Richard Feverel. A History of Father and Son. […], volume(please specify |volume=I to III), London:Chapman and Hall,→OCLC:
      He was affable; therefore he was frivolous. The women liked him; therefore he was abutterfly.
    • 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 abutterfly […].
  9. (finance) A combination of fouroptions of the same type at threestrike prices giving limited profit and limited risk.
  10. (alternate history) Arandomchange in anaspect of thetimeline seemingly unrelated to the primarypoint of divergence, resulting from thebutterfly effect.
    One potentialbutterfly could be JFK having another son the year after the POD instead of a daughter.
  11. (sports) A type ofstretch in which one sits on the ground with the legs folded into a shape like that of a butterfly's wings, slightly rocking them up and down, resembling the wingsfluttering.
  12. A person who changespartnersfrequently.
    • 2022 December 9, Darren C, “Paying For Bar Girls, Sex in Pattaya”, inPattaya Unlimited‎[2]:
      What does it mean to be abutterfly in Pattaya? It means, just like abutterfly briefly visits many flowers, you will briefly visit many different girls.
  13. (mining) A safety link or detaching hook above thecage attached to the winding rope to prevent the cage from being overwound.
  14. (Philippines, Philippine politics, often derogatory)partyswitcher;turncoat.
    Synonyms:balimbing;see alsoThesaurus:defector

Hypernyms

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Derived terms

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Descendants

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Translations

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insect
butterfly tape
swimming stroke—seebutterfly stroke
plane curve that looks like a butterfly
sensation
someone seen as unserious, flighty and unreliable
finance: type of combination of four options
random change working through butterfly effect
sports: type of stretch
person who changes partners frequently
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions atWiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Translations to be checked

Verb

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butterfly (third-person singular simple presentbutterflies,present participlebutterflying,simple past and past participlebutterflied)

  1. (transitive) Tocut (food) almost entirely inhalf andspread the halvesapart, in a shapesuggesting thewings of abutterfly.
    butterflied shrimp
    Butterfly the chicken before you grill it.
  2. (transitive) Tocutstrips ofsurgicaltape orplasters intothinstrips, andplaceacross (agapingwound) toclose it.
    • 2006, Paul Garber,Newton's Force, page256:
      After everyone had obeyed his commands, the lieutenant motioned for two medics that now appeared to enter the room and attend to Dr. Carter. They bandaged him up,butterflying some of the deeper gashes and gave him a couple of shots.
  3. (transitive, of thepoint of divergence of analternate history scenario) To cause events after the point of divergence to nothappen as they did inrealhistory, and peopleconceived after the point of divergence to notexist inrecognizable form, due to therandomvariationsintroduced by thebutterfly effect.
    Pearl Harbor not happening would'vebutterflied Taylor Swift.

See also

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extant orders of insects in English

References

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  1. ^Ringe, Donald (2006),From Proto-Indo-European to Proto-Germanic (A Linguistic History of English; 1)‎[1], Oxford: Oxford University Press,→ISBN,page232

Further reading

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Anagrams

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Danish

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Noun

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butterfly c (singular definitebutterflyen,plural indefinitebutterfly)

  1. bowtie

Inflection

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Declension ofbutterfly
common
gender		singularplural
indefinitedefiniteindefinitedefinite
nominativebutterflybutterflyenbutterflybutterflyene
genitivebutterflysbutterflyensbutterflysbutterflyenes
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