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Porcupine

 - 4 dictionary results

por⋅cu⋅pine

  [pawr-kyuh-pahyn]
Use Porcupine in a Sentence
–noun
any of several rodents covered with stiff, sharp, erectile spines or quills, as Erethizon dorsatum of North America.
Origin:
1375–1425; late ME porcupyne, var. of porcapyne; r. porke despyne < MF porc d'espine thorny pig. See pork, spine

Porcupine River

 
–noun
a river in NW Yukon Territory, Canada and NE Alaska, flowing N and W to the Yukon River. 448 mi. (721 km) long.
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
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por·cu·pine   (pôr'kyə-pīn')   
n.  Any of various rodents of the Old World family Hystricidae or the New World family Erethizontidae, having long, sharp, erectile quills interspersed with coarse hair.

[Middle English porke despine, from Old French porc espin : Latin porcus, pig; see porko- in Indo-European roots + Latin spīna, thorn, spine.]
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Word Origin & History

porcupine 
c.1400, porke despyne, from O.Fr. porc-espin (c.1220), lit. "spiny pig," from L. porcus "hog" + spina "thorn, spine." The word had many forms in M.E. and early Mod.E., including portepyn, porkpen, porkenpick, porpoynt, and Shakespeare's porpentine (in "Hamlet").
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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