ferine
Americanadjective
adjective
Etymology
Origin of ferine
1530–40; < Latin ferīnus, equivalent to fer ( a ) a wild animal (noun use of feminine of ferus wild) + -īnus -ine 1
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
In that moment, she was a throw-back of a million years, and through her veins fumed the ferine blood of her paleolithic forebears.
From The Gun-Brand by Hendryx, James B. (James Beardsley)
The sort of ferine reputation which he had acquired for himself abroad prevented numbers, of course, of his countrymen, whom he would have most cordially welcomed, from seeking his acquaintance.
From Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 With His Letters and Journals by Moore, Thomas
This does not mean that the result in either case is an all around and consistent rehabilitation of the ferine or barbarian habit of mind and body.
From Theory of the Leisure Class by Veblen, Thorstein
We killed some wild ferine creatures at the foot of these hills; but, except two things, like to nothing that we ever saw before, we met with nothing that was fit to eat.
From The Life, Adventures & Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton by Defoe, Daniel
Who, within his inner consciousness, does not feel that same ferine, savage man struggling against the stern, adamantine bonds of morality and decorum?
From Howard Pyle's Book of Pirates; fiction, fact & fancy concerning the buccaneers & marooners of the Spanish main by Pyle, Howard
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
