mew

«mew» in Mova's early modern english dictionary: cat's cry (for the mew sense, seagull) — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 3 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

kind

archaic word

modern equivalent

cat's cry (for the mew sense, seagull)

part of speech

noun and verb (also used as a noun for a sea-gull)

meaning for a pupil

In the Torah, a mew is a sea-gull, a seabird; in the fairy tales it is a cat's soft high cry. tree →

how it differs from today

Today it means only a cat's cry; the Torah sense (a sea-gull) is no longer used, and the fairy-tale sentences use the cat sense as today.

examples

• and the ostrich, and the night-hawk, and the sea-mew, and the hawk after its kinds; (Torah LEV.11.16, JPS 1917) tree →
• And then it mewed more than ever. (The Book of Dragons) tree →
• "Well, I should have mewed," said the kitchen-cat. (Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen) tree →

primary record

mew

tests

rate: word (≥3 uses, never in EWT or ≥10× EWT, Wiktionary: first sense archaic); corpora 18 (Torah 2, tales 16, Sefer Yetzirah 0); EWT 0; ratio 2.0 (Torah alone 4.7); Wiktionary archaic (first sense)

In the corpora

• and the ostrich, and the night-hawk, and the sea-mew, and the hawk after its kinds;
• and the ostrich, and the night-hawk, and the sea-mew, and the hawk after its kinds;
• White storks are almost silent and clatter their bills to greet each other, while chicks hiss and mew before they learn to clatter.

Trees and pragmatics

Every meaning and example of «mew» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.