mossie
Appearance
See also: Mossie
English
[edit]Etymology 1
[edit]From Afrikaans, from Dutch mus (“a sparrow”).
Pronunciation
[edit]Noun
[edit]mossie (plural mossies)
- (South Africa) Any of various species of sparrow, especially Passer melanurus.
- 1963, Lady Joy Petersen Packer, Home from Sea, page 221:
- Our four baby mossies have left the nest.
- 1969, J. M. Winterbottom, Cornelis Janse Uys, Some Birds of the Cape, page 93:
- Another highly successful species, which has become a serious pest of fruit, is the Mossie or Cape Sparrow. The male mossie, with his black and white head and rufous mantle, is rather a handsome little bird; his wife lacks the head markings, being grey-brown with a pale eye-stripe.
- 2004, Troy Blacklaws, Karoo Boy, page 78:
- He laughs a deep laugh that rumbles up from somewhere in his drumskin stomach. It spooks the mossies on the overhead telegraph wire.
Etymology 2
[edit]Diminutive formed from mosquito. Compare Dutch meuzie (“mosquito”).
Alternative forms
[edit]Pronunciation
[edit]Noun
[edit]mossie (plural mossies)
- (UK, Australia, New Zealand, colloquial) A mosquito.
- 1996, Patricia Shaw, The Opal Seekers, unnumbered page:
- She came out, standing a head taller than him, tugging a loose cotton shift into place, and made for a rough brick fireplace beside a pile of rusting pots and pans.
‘Come inside,’ Willi said. ‘The mossies will eat you alive out here.’
- 2003, Jack Lagan, A B Sea: A Loose-Footed Lexicon, page 211:
- Tip 1 : Make sure there is clearance between your body and the net. If the net touches your skin, the mossie will be able to bite you through it.
- 2012, Susan Kurosawa, Coasting: A Year by the Bay, unnumbered page:
- He had becoms full of Bay intelligence about mosquito repellent measures. Apart from the obvious—mossie coils, citronella candles, zappers, fine nets suspended over beds and Rid roll-on or spray—he decided to invest in bush gear from an army disposal store. The mossies, who know a city slicker when they bite one, had been stinging clear through his Calvin Clone T-shirts from the Hong Kong markets and feasting on his bare arms as if presented with a juicy buffet.
Anagrams
[edit]Afrikaans
[edit]Etymology
[edit]From the diminutive of dialectal Dutch mos, a Hollandic byform of mus.
Noun
[edit]mossie (plural mossies, diminutive mossietjie)
Categories:
- English terms borrowed from Afrikaans
- English terms derived from Afrikaans
- English terms derived from Dutch
- English 2-syllable words
- English terms with IPA pronunciation
- English lemmas
- English nouns
- English countable nouns
- South African English
- English terms with quotations
- English terms with audio pronunciation
- Rhymes:English/ɒzi
- Rhymes:English/ɒzi/2 syllables
- British English
- Australian English
- New Zealand English
- English colloquialisms
- en:Mosquitoes
- en:True sparrows
- Afrikaans terms derived from Middle Dutch
- Afrikaans terms inherited from Middle Dutch
- Afrikaans terms derived from Old Dutch
- Afrikaans terms inherited from Old Dutch
- Afrikaans terms derived from Latin
- Afrikaans terms inherited from Dutch
- Afrikaans terms derived from Dutch
- Afrikaans lemmas
- Afrikaans nouns