mooncalf
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See also: moon-calf
English
[edit]
Alternative forms
[edit]Etymology
[edit]From moon + calf, after a superstition that the moon caused abnormal fetal development.
Pronunciation
[edit]Noun
[edit]mooncalf (plural mooncalves)
- (now rare) An abnormal mass within the uterus; a false conception. [from 16th c.]
- 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene ii]:
- Thou art very Trinculo indeed! How camest thou to be the siege of this moon-calf? Can he vent Trinculos?
- A poorly-conceived idea or plan. [from 17th c.]
- A dreamer, someone absent-minded or distracted; a fool, simpleton. [from 17th c.]
- 1902, John Kendrick Bangs, chapter 10, in Olympian Nights[1], New York: Harper & Bros., page 185:
- “ […] you’re a jobbernowl and a doodle, a maundering mooncalf and a blockheaded numps, a gaby and a loon; you’re a Hatter!” I shrieked the last epithet.
- 1957, Ogden Nash, “Come On In, The Senility Is Fine”, in You Can’t Get There From Here[2], Boston: Little, Brown & Co., page 66:
- But I can think of no one but a mooncalf or a gaby
Who would trust their own child to raise a baby.
- 1978, Lawrence Durrell, Livia (Avignon Quintet), Faber & Faber, published 1992, page 463:
- He slipped it softly onto her unresisting finger and, like the unwise moncalf he was, kissed it.