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locust.

Any of the grasshoppers, often polyphenic and usually swarming, in the family Acrididae that are very destructive to crops and other vegetation, especially migratory locusts (Locusta migratoria).

6 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈləʊ.kəst/UK/ˈloʊ.kəst/US
  1. Any of the grasshoppers, often polyphenic and usually swarming, in the family Acrididae that are very destructive to crops and other vegetation, especially migratory locusts (Locusta migratoria).

  2. A fruit or pod of a carob tree (Ceratonia siliqua).

    historical
  3. Any of various often leguminous trees and shrubs, especially of the genera Robinia and Gleditsia; locust tree.

  4. A cicada.

  5. A mainlander.

    Hong-Kong · derogatory · ethnic · offensive · slur
  6. A dose of laudanum.

    UK · obsolete · slang
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *lek-der.? Latin locusta Anglo-Norman locustebor. Middle English locuste English locust Inherited from Middle English locuste, locust, from Anglo-Norman locuste, Middle French locuste, and their source, Latin locustam (“locust, crustacean, lobster”, accusative of locusta). Doublet of langouste. Noun sense 3 (“kind of tree”), originally referring to the carob (compare locust bean), is based on the resemblance of the trees' beanlike seed pods to the insect and is likely a semantic loan from Ancient Greek ἀκρίς (akrís). Noun sense 5 (“mainlander”) is a semantic loan from Cantonese 蝗蟲 /蝗虫 (wong4 cung4), also meaning "locust".

verb/ˈləʊ.kəst/UK/ˈloʊ.kəst/US
  1. To come in a swarm.

    intransitive
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *lek-der.? Latin locusta Anglo-Norman locustebor. Middle English locuste English locust Inherited from Middle English locuste, locust, from Anglo-Norman locuste, Middle French locuste, and their source, Latin locustam (“locust, crustacean, lobster”, accusative of locusta). Doublet of langouste. Noun sense 3 (“kind of tree”), originally referring to the carob (compare locust bean), is based on the resemblance of the trees' beanlike seed pods to the insect and is likely a semantic loan from Ancient Greek ἀκρίς (akrís). Noun sense 5 (“mainlander”) is a semantic loan from Cantonese 蝗蟲 /蝗虫 (wong4 cung4), also meaning "locust".

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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.