Word Origin Atlas

Exact historical dictionary sense

Animal in Webster's 1913 dictionary

The 1913 record labels animal as noun. Its source-bounded etymology and selected historical definition appear below.

WEBSTER 1913noun
Animal

[L., fr. anima breath, soul: cf. F. animal. See Animate.]

Cross-verified historical sense
The source text may be outdated. The page preserves that historical boundary.
Cross-verified 1913 record
Headwordanimal
Part of speechnoun
Historical etymology[L., fr. anima breath, soul: cf. F. animal. See Animate.]
Selected historical definitionAn organized living being endowed with sensation and the power of voluntary motion, and also characterized by taking its food into an internal cavity or stomach for digestion; by giving carbonic acid to the air and taking oxygen in the process of respiration; and by increasing in motive power or active aggressive force with progress to maturity.
Signed record IDwebster1913-animal-noun-2bbff59d596d
Source locatorCIDE.A, paragraph 8244; Gutenberg eBook 660
Edition-scoped answerNot earliest-attestation proofNot modern consensus
Independent historical textProject Gutenberg section 660Signed structural record sourceGNU GCIDE 0.54 archive
Quick answer

In Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913), "animal" is labeled noun. Its etymology is recorded as: "[L., fr. anima breath, soul: cf. F. animal. See Animate.]" The selected historical definition says: "An organized living being endowed with sensation and the power of voluntary motion, and also characterized by taking its food into an internal cavity or stomach for digestion; by giving carbonic acid to the air and taking oxygen in the process of respiration; and by increasing in motive power or active aggressive force with progress to maturity."

Project Gutenberg Webster 1913 plus signed GNU GCIDE 0.54 Exact cross-verified historical record reviewed 2026-10-04

What this answer proves

One named sense in one historical dictionary edition.

The answer reports the selected headword, part of speech, etymology, definition, and source locator as transcribed in the cross-verified 1913 record.

Evidence boundaryIt does not establish the earliest attestation or a complete borrowing chain.It does not claim current scholarly consensus or a modern dictionary definition.Historical dictionary text may be obsolete, incomplete, inaccurate, or offensive by modern standards.

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