Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Any of several blowflies of the genus Calliphora that have a bright metallic-blue body and lay their eggs in decaying organic matter.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun plural The grape-hyacinth, Muscari botryoides and M. racemosum. See
Muscari . - noun In bot., Centaurea Cyanus, a composite plant, a weed in Europe, cultivated for ornament in America. Also called
bluebonnet and bluecap. - noun In zoology, a dipterous insect with a blue abdomen, of the family Muscidæ and genus Musca, or Calliphora. Also popularly called
beef-eater and blue flesh-fly. - noun A policeman, a beadle, or other officer wearing a blue dress.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Bot.) an annual Eurasian plant (
Centaurea cyanus ) which grows in grain fields; -- called alsobachelor's button . It receives its name from its blue bottle-shaped flowers. Varieties cultivated in North America have showy heads of blue or purple or pink or white flowers. - noun (Zoöl.) A large and troublesome species of blowfly (
Musca vomitoria ). Its body is steel blue.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Any of various
blowflies of the genus Calliphora that have aniridescent metallic-blue body and make a loud buzzing noise whilst flying. - noun Any of various marine creatures of the order Physalia, such as Physalia physalis, the
Portuguese man-of-war . - noun Centaurea cyanus, a
plant that grows ingrain fields , with blue flowers resembling bottles.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun an annual Eurasian plant cultivated in North America having showy heads of blue or purple or pink or white flowers
- noun blowfly with iridescent blue body; makes a loud buzzing noise in flight
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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And once Fenn had put in one song it was inevitable that he would put in another, for which the bluebottle was the "singer".
Featherland How the Birds lived at Greenlawn George Manville Fenn 1870
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At times Sam Brown's production makes Gill's subtext overly apparent: the cast are onstage throughout so that, when Dennis goes to kill a bluebottle, he attacks his father seen praying behind Annemarie Woods's set.
Over Gardens Out - review Michael Billington 2010
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He said he had always thought "that the taste of mole was the most repulsive" he knew, until he ate a bluebottle fly.
Welcome to the Museum Of Weird and Wonderful Paul Levy 2011
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He said he had always thought "that the taste of mole was the most repulsive" he knew, until he ate a bluebottle fly.
Welcome to the Museum Of Weird and Wonderful Paul Levy 2011
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The book is full of scientific observations of creatures such as the sea speckle, the red poison needle, the oleander, the bluebottle or coral.
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And the camera pulled back to reveal the bluebottle was sitting on top of this brown mess.
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I suddenly got a really bizarre image of the bluebottle fly version of “Two Girls, One Cup”.
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I suddenly got a really bizarre image of the bluebottle fly version of “Two Girls, One Cup”.
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But crucially, the case against the doctor was also much aided by a certain Dr AG Mearns, an expert on insects, who established the date on which the body parts had been deposited in the ravine from the presence of a mass of bluebottle larvae, aged 12 to 14 days, crawling all over them.
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In Britain, they include the common bluebottle and greenbottle, and they are the forensic entomologist's raw material.
johnmperry commented on the word bluebottle
one of the major characters in The Goon Show
July 18, 2008
madmouth commented on the word bluebottle
see here. Also known as hurtsickle
June 4, 2009