Definify.com
Webster 1913 Edition
Snail
Snail
(snāl)
, Noun.
[OE.
snaile
, AS. snægel
, snegel
, snægl
; akin to G. schnecke
, OHG. snecko
, Dan. snegl
, Icel. snigill
.] 1.
(Zool.)
(a)
Any one of numerous species of terrestrial air-breathing gastropods belonging to the genus Helix and many allied genera of the family
Helicidae
. They are abundant in nearly all parts of the world except the arctic regions, and feed almost entirely on vegetation; a land snail. (b)
2.
Hence, a drone; a slow-moving person or thing.
3.
(Mech.)
A spiral cam, or a flat piece of metal of spirally curved outline, used for giving motion to, or changing the position of, another part, as the hammer tail of a striking clock.
4.
A tortoise; in ancient warfare, a movable roof or shed to protect besiegers; a testudo.
[Obs.]
They had also all manner of gynes [engines] . . . that needful is [in] taking or sieging of castle or of city, as
snails
, that was naught else but hollow pavises and targets, under the which men, when they fought, were heled [protected], . . . as the snail
is in his house; therefore they cleped them snails
. Vegetius (Trans.).
5.
(Bot.)
The pod of the sanil clover.
Ear snail
, Edible snail
, Pond snail
Snail borer
(Zool.)
, a boring univalve mollusk; a drill.
– Snail clover
(Bot.)
, a cloverlike plant (
– Medicago scuttellata
, also, Medicago Helix
); – so named from its pods, which resemble the shells of snails; – called also snail trefoil
, snail medic
, and beehive
. Snail flower
(Bot.)
, a leguminous plant (
– Phaseolus Caracalla
) having the keel of the carolla spirally coiled like a snail shell. Snail shell
(Zool.)
, the shell of snail.
– Snail trefoil
. (Bot.)
See
Snail clover
, above.Webster 1828 Edition
Snail
SNAIL
, n.1.
A slimy slow creeping animal, of the genus Helix, and order of Mollusca. The eyes of this insect are in the horns, one at the end of each, which it can retract at pleasure.2.
A drone; a slow moving person.Definition 2024
snail
snail
English
Garden snail.
Noun
snail (plural snails)
- Any of very many animals (either hermaphroditic or nonhermaphroditic), of the class Gastropoda, having a coiled shell.
- 1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 7, in The China Governess:
- ‘Children crawled over each other like little grey worms in the gutters,’ he said. ‘The only red things about them were their buttocks and they were raw. Their faces looked as if snails had slimed on them and their mothers were like great sick beasts whose byres had never been cleared. […]’
-
- (informal, by extension) A slow person; a sluggard.
- (engineering) A spiral cam, or a flat piece of metal of spirally curved outline, used for giving motion to, or changing the position of, another part, as the hammer tail of a striking clock.
- (military, historical) A tortoise or testudo; a movable roof or shed to protect besiegers.
- Vegetius (in translation)
- They had also all manner of gynes [engines] […] that needful is [in] taking or sieging of castle or of city, as snails, that was naught else but hollow pavises and targets, under the which men, when they fought, were heled [protected] […]
- Vegetius (in translation)
- The pod of the snail clover.
Derived terms
Translations
any animal of the class Gastropoda having a shell
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sluggard
See also
Verb
snail (third-person singular simple present snails, present participle snailing, simple past and past participle snailed)