butter

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A soft yellowish or whitish emulsion of butterfat, water, air, and sometimes salt, churned from milk or cream and processed for use in cooking and as a food.
2. n. Any of various substances similar to butter, especially:
3. n. A spread made from fruit, nuts, or other foods: apple butter.
4. n. A vegetable fat having a nearly solid consistency at ordinary temperatures.
5. n. Flattery.
6. v. To put butter on or in.
7. butter up To praise or flatter excessively: You're always buttering up the boss.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. The fatty portion of milk. AS prepared for use, it contains 80 to 85 per cent of fats, with varying amounts of water and salt, and minute quantities of sugar and curd. It is used as a food or relish by most peoples, and is made directly from the milk, or from the cream previously separated from the milk, of cows, goats, and other animals. Agitation or churning separates the fats from the milk or cream and makes them cohere in lumps, which are then worked together, freed as far as possible from buttermilk, and usually mixed with salt, which preserves the butter and develops its flavor.
2. n. In old chemistry, a term applied to certain anhydrous metallic chlorids of buttery consistence and fusibility.
3. To smear with butter.
4. To flatter grossly: as, he buttered him to his heart's content.
5. In gambling slang, to stake the previous winnings, with addition, at every throw or every game.
6. n. One who or that which butts; an animal that butts.
7. n. A machine for sawing off the ends of boards, to square them and remove faulty parts.
8. n. An obsolete form of bittern. Compare butterbump.
9. n. One who has charge of a butt or fire-bucket. See butt, n., 1.
10. In cricket, to fail to make a simple and easy catch; to muff.

Wiktionary

1. n. A soft, fatty foodstuff made by churning the cream of milk (generally cow's milk).
2. n. Any specific soft substance
3. n. Any of various foodstuffs made from other foods or oils, similar in consistency to, eaten like or intended as a substitute for butter (preceded by the name of the food used to make it).
4. v. To spread butter on.
5. v. To move one's weight backwards or forwards onto the tips or tails of one's skis or snowboard so only the tip or tail is in contact with the snow.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. An oily, unctuous substance obtained from cream or milk by churning.
2. n. Any substance resembling butter in degree of consistence, or other qualities, especially, in old chemistry, the chlorides, as butter of antimony, sesquichloride of antimony; also, certain concrete fat oils remaining nearly solid at ordinary temperatures, as butter of cacao, vegetable butter, shea butter.
3. v. To cover or spread with butter.
4. v. To increase, as stakes, at every throw or every game.
5. n. One who, or that which, butts.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. an edible emulsion of fat globules made by churning milk or cream; for cooking and table use
2. n. a fighter who strikes the opponent with his head
3. v. spread butter on