Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Covered with gold or gilt.
  • adjective Resembling gold, as in color or luster.
  • noun A thin layer of gold or a paint containing or simulating gold that is applied in gilding.
  • noun Superficial brilliance or gloss.
  • noun Slang Money.
  • noun A young sow that has not farrowed.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • An obsolete variant of gild.
  • noun Money; geld.
  • noun A young female pig.
  • Gilded.
  • Of the color of gold; bright-yellow.
  • noun The material used in gilding.
  • noun One of a class of thieves.
  • noun A Middle English form of guilt.
  • A simplified spelling of guilt.
  • noun In archery, the innermost circle of the target; the gold.
  • noun Preterit of gild.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Zoöl.) A female pig, when young.
  • imp. & p. p. of gild.
  • past participle Gilded; covered with gold; of the color of gold; golden yellow.
  • noun Gold, or that which resembles gold, laid on the surface of a thing; gilding.
  • noun obsolete Money.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A young female pig, at or nearing the age of first breeding.
  • verb Simple past tense and past participle of gild.
  • noun uncountable Gold or other metal in a thin layer; gilding.
  • noun uncountable, slang Money.
  • noun countable, finance A security issued by the Bank of England (see gilt-edged)
  • adjective golden coloured

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective having the deep slightly brownish color of gold
  • noun a coating of gold or of something that looks like gold

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, young sow, from Old Norse gyltr.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

See geld.

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Examples

Comments

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  • a young, female pig

    August 22, 2008

  • A young female pig...who knew?

    June 24, 2011

  • It's already on my swine list. :-)

    June 24, 2011

  • I'm just waaaaaaay outta the loop! (but wanted to link the cartoon at least).

    June 24, 2011

  • Oh! I didn't even see the cartoon. It's great, oroboros!

    June 24, 2011

  • The "young female pig" definition was new to me, too. I just came across it:

    "All the cattle brought handsome sums, and then it was the pigs' turn. One by one they were displayed: the gilts, the shoats, the cranky old sow and her litter of half-grown piglets."

    Then There Were Five by Elizabeth Enright, pp 239-240 of the 2002 hardcover edition

    July 12, 2011