Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Of or relating to veterinary medicine; concerned or connected with the medical or surgical treatment of animals, especially domestic animals.
  • noun A veterinarian.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Of or pertaining to domestic animals; specifically, pertaining to the surgical or medical treatment of domestic animals, especially of horses and cattle: as, a veterinary surgeon; veterinary medicine; a veterinary college or school.
  • noun pl. veterinaries (-riz). A veterinarian.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Of or pertaining to the art of healing or treating the diseases of domestic animals, as oxen, horses, sheep, various pets, etc..

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Of or relating to the medical or surgical treatment of animals, especially domestic and farm animals
  • noun A veterinary surgeon, a veterinarian

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a doctor who practices veterinary medicine
  • adjective of or relating to veterinarians or veterinary medicine

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin veterīnārius, from veterīnae, beasts of burden, from feminine pl. of veterīnus, of beasts of burden; see wet- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Back-formation from veterinarian.

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Examples

Comments

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  • Oddly, the Yorkshire (I think) pronunciation vit'nry comes to mind almost every time I see this word.

    September 22, 2008