Webster
✕

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Butterfly

But′ter·fly′ (·flī′), n.; pl. Butterflies. [Perh. from the color of a yellow species. AS. buter-flēge, buttor-fleóge; cf. G. butterfliege, D. botervlieg. See Butter, and Fly.] (Zoöl.) A general name for the numerous species of diurnal Lepidoptera. [See Illust. under Aphrodite.]

Asclepias butterfly. See under Asclepias. — Butterfly fish (Zoöl.), the ocellated blenny (Blennius ocellaris) of Europe. See Blenny. The term is also applied to the flying gurnard. — Butterfly shell (Zoöl.), a shell of the genus Voluta. — Butterfly valve (Mech.), a kind of double clack valve, consisting of two semicircular clappers or wings hinged to a cross rib in the pump bucket. When open it somewhat resembles a butterfly in shape.

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty. Of the others, 1,362 (a word or a single letter each) were inferred by AI from the context by the dictionary’s own rules and are marked with a wavy underline (tap or point at one to see the note); the rest, which could not be inferred with confidence, are left as “?”.