BEEF • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Beef

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/bif/ Listen

noun

Beef n.

An animal of the genus Bos, especially the common species, Bos taurus, including the bull, cow, and ox, in their full grown state; esp., an ox or cow fattened for food. Note: (In this, which is the original sense, the word has a plural, beeves.) "A herd of beeves, fair oxen and fair kine."

The flesh of an ox, or cow, or of any adult bovine animal, when slaughtered for food. Note: (In this sense, the word has no plural.) "Great meals of beef."

Applied colloquially to human flesh.

adjective

Beef adj. Of, pertaining to, or resembling, beef.

Beef tea, essence of beef, or strong beef broth.

See images of 'Beef'

Etymology of 'Beef'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Beef" Quotes from Famous Books

... she exclaimed, "how would I have cold beef? And as for cheese—!" She paused, and then, curiosity over-powering all other emotions. "What ails Julia Cronelly at all that your honour's ladyship is comin' to the like o' this dirty place ...

— All on the Irish Shore - Irish Sketches • E. Somerville and Martin Ross

... a Taunton man was seen last in company with a man subsequently found dead. In the Taunton man's possession was a knife with a slight film of blood on the blade. He said he had been cutting raw beef. The analyst easily showed, however, that the blood on the knife came from a living animal; and, further, he found on it some little scales from the lining of the human gullet. The ...

— The Harmsworth Magazine, v. 1, 1898-1899, No. 2 • Various

... be joyful! Have given up all meat diet. Have given up beef, pork, lamb, mutton, veal, chicken, pigs' feet, bacon, hash, corned beef, venison, bear steak, frogs' legs, opossum, and fried snails. Weigh only nine hundred and forty pounds. Affectionate ...

— Philo Gubb Correspondence-School Detective • Ellis Parker Butler

... Christendom his importance as the generalissimo of the angelic host was remembered and commemorated, it seemed hard indeed to the seraph in disguise that he must still guard his incognito, still go on as usual with his petty higgling over corned beef and biscuits and the price of jute sacking. "There was war in heaven," said the gospel for the day—that sonorous gospel Mrs. Trevennack so cordially dreaded—for her husband would always go to church at morning ...

— Michael's Crag • Grant Allen

... corporations of any size are engaged in interstate business. The passage of the railway rate bill, and only to a less degree the passage of the pure food bill, and the provision for increasing and rendering more effective national control over the beef-packing industry, mark an important advance in the proper direction. In the short session it will perhaps be difficult to do much further along this line; and it may be best to wait until the laws have been in operation for a number of months before ...

— State of the Union Addresses of Theodore Roosevelt • Theodore Roosevelt

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