conch

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. Any of various tropical marine gastropod mollusks, especially of the genera Strombus and Cassis, having large, often brightly colored spiral shells and edible flesh.
2. n. The shell of one of these gastropod mollusks, used as an ornament, in making cameos, or as a horn.
3. n. Anatomy See concha.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. A shell of any kind.
2. n. Specifically, a large marine shell, especially that of the Strombus gigas, sometimes called fountain-shell, from its use in gardens. Conchs have been much used as instruments of call, producing a very loud sound when blown. Often called conch-shell.
3. n. A spiral shell fabled to have been used by the Tritons as a trumpet, probably of the kind now constituting the genus Triton, and used as a musical instrument in the South Sea islands. Also conch-shell.
4. n. A trumpet in the form of sea-shell. Also called Triton's-horn.
5. n. The external portion of the ear; the concha.
6. n. In architecture, the plain, ribless, concave surface of a vault or pendentive; the semidome of an apse; the apse itself. See apse. Also called concha.
7. n. [Also written conk, conck. konk.] One of the lower class of inhabitants of the Bahamas, and of the keys on the Florida reef: so named from their extensive use of the flesh from conchs as food.
8. n. One of an inferior class of white inhabitants of some parts of North Carolina.
9. n. In the cephalopod mollusks, the postembryonic shell: contrasted with protoconch or embryonal shell, and with shell, a term which loosely covers the entire external skeleton.
10. n. The whelk, Fulgur carica
11. n. the helmet-shell, Cassis.
12. n. In Roman antiquity, the name for various small vessels used for oil, salt, etc.
13. n. Same as conk.
14. n. Abbreviations of conchology.

Wiktionary

1. n. A marine mollusc of the family Strombidae which lives in its own spiral shell.
2. n. The shell of this sea animal.
3. n. A musical instrument made from a large spiral seashell.
4. n. A machine (rather like a rotating pestle and mortar) used to develop the flavour and texture of chocolate by warming and grinding; a concher or concher machine.
5. v. To refine the flavour and texture of chocolate by warming and grinding, either in a traditional concher, or between rollers.
6. v. To play a conch seashell as a musical instrument, by blowing through a hole made close to the origin of the spiral.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. (Zoöl.) A name applied to various marine univalve shells; esp. to those of the genus Strombus, which are of large size. Strombus gigas is the large pink West Indian conch. The large king, queen, and cameo conchs are of the genus Cassis. See cameo and cameo conch.
2. n. In works of art, the shell used by Tritons as a trumpet.
3. n. One of the white natives of the Bahama Islands or one of their descendants in the Florida Keys; -- so called from the commonness of the conch there, or because they use it for food.
4. n. (Arch.) See Concha, n.
5. n. The external ear. See Concha, n., 2.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. any of various edible tropical marine gastropods of the genus Strombus having a brightly-colored spiral shell with large outer lip