cow.
An adult female of the species Bos taurus, especially one that has calved.
Meaning & usage
An adult female of the species Bos taurus, especially one that has calved.
The whole herd is out to pasture right now — the cows, calves, and heifers are out back, and the bulls are down by the creek.
Any member of the species Bos taurus that is not of a bucking breed or fighting breed, regardless of sex or age, including steers and calves.
We saw lots of cows at the farm show, including some surprisingly gigantic bulls.
Beef: the meat of cattle as food.
The only meat I eat is cow.
Any bovines or bovids generally, including yaks, buffalo, etc.
A female member of other large species of mammal, including the bovines, moose, whales, seals, hippos, rhinos, manatees, and elephants.
A woman considered unpleasant in some way, particularly one considered nasty, stupid, fat, lazy, or difficult.
A chock: a wedge or brake used to stop a machine or car.
A third-year cadet at West Point.
A fish that is very large for its species, such as a large striped bass or large bluefin tuna.
Where this word comes from
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *gʷṓws Proto-Germanic *kōz Proto-West Germanic *kō Old English cū Middle English cow English cow Inherited from Middle English cow, cou, from Old English cū (“cow”), from Proto-West Germanic *kō, from Proto-Germanic *kōz (“cow”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʷṓws (“cow”). Cognate with Sanskrit गो (go), Ancient Greek βοῦς (boûs), Persian گاو (gâv)), Latvian govs (“cow”), Proto-Slavic *govędo (Serbo-Croatian govedo, Russian говядина (govjadina, “beef”), Scots coo (“cow”), North Frisian ko, kø (“cow”), West Frisian ko (“cow”), Dutch koe (“cow”), Low German Koh, Koo, Kau (“cow”), German Kuh (“cow”), Danish and Swedish ko (“cow”), Norwegian Bokmål and Norwegian Nynorsk ku (“cow”), Faroese kúgv (“cow”), Icelandic kýr (“cow”), Latin bōs (“ox, bull, cow”) (whence English beef), Armenian կով (kov, “cow”). Doublet of beef. The plural kine is from Middle English kyne, kyn, kuin, kiin, kien (“cows”), either a double plural of Middle English ky, kye (“cows”), equivalent to modern kye + -en, or inherited from Old English cūna (“cows', of cows”), genitive plural of cū (“cow”).
To intimidate; to daunt the spirits or courage of.
Con artists are not cowed by the law.
Where this word comes from
Probably from Old Norse kúga (“to oppress”) (whence also Norwegian and Danish kue, Swedish kuva); compare Icelandic kúfa (“to set on top”) and Faroese kúga (“to oppress”).
A chimney cowl.
LFBOT: Synonym of luminous fast blue optical transient.
Where this word comes from
Clipping of AT2018cow. From the name of the archetypal event, AT2018cow, an LFBOT. From being an astronomical transient (AT) occurring in 2018, with an automatically assigned code to distinguish it from other events in 2018.
Try it on your idea.
cow has 3 characters. Say it out loud, try it alongside a description of your project, and see whether its meaning fits what you want to create.
These are naming prompts. Meanings and pronunciation can vary; existing brand and domain uses have not been checked.
Explore the name generatorA word with a source.
Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.