cuspidor

American  

[kuhs-pi-dawr] / ˈkʌs pɪˌdɔr /

noun

1. a large bowl, often of metal, serving as a receptacle for spit, especially from chewing tobacco: in wide use during the 19th and early 20th centuries.

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cuspidor British  

/ ˈkʌspɪˌdɔː /

noun

1. another word (esp US) for spittoon

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Etymology

Origin of cuspidor

1770–80; < Portuguese: literally, spitter, equivalent to cusp ( ir ) to spit (≪ Latin conspuere to cover with spit; con- con- + spuere to spit ¹ ) + -idor < Latin -i-tōrium; -i-, -tory ²

Example Sentences

Alney Chaffee made a lunge for it but it escaped him, with a resounding clank fell into a large brass cuspidor.

From Time Magazine Archive

There was a fireplace in every living room, a gilded chamber pot under every bed, a brass cuspidor in every room.

From Time Magazine Archive

Official Scorer Johnny Little, known as "the keeper of the cuspidor," cautions: "No licorice or other foreign matter mixed in."

From Time Magazine Archive

But when he wandered over again and bought their printshop, lock, stock and cuspidor, with its two weekly papers, their reaction was not so simple.

From Time Magazine Archive

Bonaparte had partaken of his fourth cuspidor of beer and was in a delightful state of swagger and fight when he saw an unusual commotion up the street.

From The Bishop of Cottontown A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills by Moore, John Trotwood