Log in or Sign up

Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. n. A large wave or swell of water.
  2. n. A great swell, surge, or undulating mass, as of smoke or sound.
  3. v. To surge or roll in billows.
  4. v. To swell out or bulge: sheets billowing in the breeze.
  5. v. To cause to billow: wind that billowed the sails.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. n. A great wave or surge of the sea, occasioned usually by a violent wind: much used in figurative applications, and often, especially in the plural, as merely equivalent to wave: as, the billows of sorrow rolled over him.
  2. n. Synonyms See wave.
  3. To swell; rise and roll in large waves or surges.
  4. To raise in waves or billows.

Wiktionary

  1. n. A large wave, swell, surge, or undulating mass of water, smoke or sound
  2. v. To surge or roll in billows
  3. v. To swell out or bulge

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. n. A great wave or surge of the sea or other water, caused usually by violent wind.
  2. n. A great wave or flood of anything.
  3. v. To surge; to rise and roll in waves or surges; to undulate.

WordNet 3.0

  1. n. a large sea wave
  2. v. become inflated
  3. v. move with great difficulty
  4. v. rise and move, as in waves or billows
  5. v. rise up as if in waves

Etymologies

  1. From Old Norse bylgja, a wave; see bhelgh- in Indo-European roots.

Examples

Show 10 more examples...

Log in or sign up to add your own related words.

Lists

These user-created lists contain the word ‘billow’.

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • thnzuh "She unzips her coverall all the way down below her navel. Underneath is naught but billowing pale flesh." (p. 53, Snow Crash) Dec 27, 2010

‘billow’ has been looked up 1899 times, loved by 4 people, added to 39 lists, commented on 1 time, and has a Scrabble score of 11.