☼ Concept Map

''wolverine'' ▫ᴱᴺ Entries

↩ 🔳 🔳 🔳

Primary

⁀➴

''wolverine'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260313192153-00-⌔

wolverine - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

🖼️ ➺

Noun

wolverine (plural wolverines)

  • A solitary, fierce mammal of the Mustelidae family, Gulo gulo.
    • ✤ “Wish I’d been more polite to that girl,” the sheriff remarked regretfully. “I ain’t had a bite to eat since four o’clock this morning, and I’m hungry as a wolverine. … I know she’d have give me another drink of that old moonshine she has.”1

Etymology

1619; alteration of earlier wolvering (1574), diminutive of wolver (“ravenous or savage animal; person who behaves like a wolf”) (1593),2 ultimately from wolf.

Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ˈwʊlvəˌɹiːn/, /ˈwɒlvəˌɹiːn/
  • Audio (Southern England): 🔊
  • (US, also) IPA: /ˌwʊlvəˈɹiːn/
  • Audio (US): 🔊

Printed 2026-06-28.

(echo:: @ ⌗)

Footnotes

  1. 1920, Peter B. Kyne, chapter IV, in The Understanding Heart: ↩

  2. Robert K. Barnhart, ed., Chambers Dictionary of Etymology (Edinburgh: Chambers, 2008), 1242. ↩

Link to original

Secondary

• • •