vulture
Americannoun
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any of several large, primarily carrion-eating Old World birds of prey of the family Accipitridae, often having a naked head and less powerful feet than those of the related hawks and eagles.
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any of several superficially similar New World birds of the family Cathartidae, as the turkey vulture.
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a person or thing that preys, especially greedily or unscrupulously.
That vulture would sell out his best friend.
noun
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any of various very large diurnal birds of prey of the genera Neophron, Gyps, Gypaetus, etc, of Africa, Asia, and warm parts of Europe, typically having broad wings and soaring flight and feeding on carrion: family Accipitridae (hawks) See also griffon 1 lammergeier
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any similar bird of the family Cathartidae of North, Central, and South America See also condor turkey buzzard
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a person or thing that preys greedily and ruthlessly on others, esp the helpless
Other Word Forms
- vulture-like adjective
- vulturelike adjective
Etymology
Origin of vulture
1325–75; Middle English < Latin vultur
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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.
I finally looked up the species: It was a gallinazo, also known as a black vulture, and as much as we might ignore them, they’d been circling the whole time.
From Slate • Mar. 30, 2026
Critics tend to debate whether she is a vulture or just losing her grasp on reality, but there’s no question she’s hit on a successful formula.
From Slate • Feb. 27, 2026
Meanwhile the narrator’s financially devious husband appears as a vulture with “the brooding eye, the blood-tipped beak, the flabby folds of flesh” of a bird of prey.
From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 24, 2025
In the 1990s, the unintentional decimation of the vulture populations in India led to an increased awareness of their role in human health.
From BBC • Aug. 25, 2025
The thought that had been circling in my mind like a vulture finally settled.
From "The Season of Styx Malone" by Kekla Magoon
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.
