Definitions

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

  • noun A person who can neither hear nor speak.
  • adjective Being deaf and unable to speak.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A person who is both deaf and dumb, the dumbness resulting from deafness which has existed either from birth or from a very early period of the person's life.
  • noun A subject for dissection.

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

  • noun See Illust. of Dactylology. A person who is deaf and dumb; one who, through deprivation or defect of hearing, has either failed the acquire the power of speech, or has lost it.

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

  • adjective Unable to hear or speak
  • noun A person who is unable to hear or speak.

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

  • adjective lacking the sense of hearing and the ability to speak
  • noun a deaf person who is unable to speak

Etymologies

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