trout
/tɹaʊt/ noun, verb, proper noun
Forms trouts trouting trouted
- noun Any of several species of fish in Salmonidae, closely related to salmon, and distinguished by spawning more than once. “Many anglers consider trout to be the archetypical quarry.”
- noun (UK, derogatory) An objectionable elderly woman. “Look, you silly old trout, you can't keep bringing home cats! You can't afford the ones you have!”
- verb (intransitive) To fish for trout.
- verb (transitive, Internet chat) To (figuratively) slap someone with a slimy, stinky, wet trout; to admonish jocularly.
- proper noun A surname.
Etymology
From Middle English troute, troughte, trught, trouȝt, trouhte, partly from Old English truht (“trout”), and partly from Old French truite; both from Late Latin tructa, perhaps from Ancient Greek τρώκτης (trṓktēs, “nibbler”), from τρώγω (trṓgō, “to gnaw”), from Proto-Indo-European *terh₁- (“to rub, to turn”). The Internet verb sense originated on BBSes of the 1980s, probably from Monty Python's The Fish-Slapping Dance (1972), though that sketch involved a halibut.
Webster’s 1913
- noun Any one of numerous species of fishes belonging to Salmo, Salvelinus, and allied genera of the family Salmonidæ. They are highly esteemed as game fishes and for the quality of their flesh.
- noun Any one of several species of marine fishes more or less resembling a trout in appearance or habits, but not belonging to the same family, especially the California rock trouts, the common squeteague, and the southern, or spotted, squeteague; --called also salt-water trout, sea trout, shad trout, and gray trout. See Squeteague, and Rock trout under Rock. Trout perch (Zoöl.), a small fresh-water American fish (Percopsis guttatus), allied to the trout, but resembling a perch in its scales and mouth.
Sources: Wiktionary · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “trout”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details