Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. The skin of a sheep either tanned with the fleece left on or in the form of leather or parchment.
- n. Informal A diploma.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. The skin of a sheep; especially, such a skin dressed or preserved with the wool on, and used as a garment in many parts of Europe, as by peasants, shepherds, etc. The skin of a sheep fastened to the end of a long stick is used in Australia for beating out bush-fires.
- n. Leather made from the skin of a sheep. See sheep, 2.
- n. A diploma, deed, or the like engrossed on parchment prepared from the skin of the sheep.
Wiktionary
- n. uncountable The skin of a sheep, especially when used to make parchment or in bookbinding
- n. US, countable A diploma
- n. countable The tanned skin of a sheep with the fleece left on, especially when used for clothing, rugs etc
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The skin of a sheep; or, leather prepared from it.
- n. College Cant A diploma; -- so called because usually written or printed on parchment prepared from the skin of the sheep.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a document certifying the successful completion of a course of study
- n. tanned skin of a sheep with the fleece left on; used for clothing
- n. skin of a sheep or goat prepared for writing on
Etymologies
- sheep + skin (Wiktionary)
Examples
“One would have thought that the rise in the value of a sheepskin from a 30% lifetime wage premium over a high-school diploma in 1975 to a 90% premium in 2005 would have called forth an extraordinary wave of public support and public funding for investment in education that would have pushed that premium down somewhat: lots more Americans should be getting a higher education now than were getting one in the mid-1970s.”
Earth to Educators: People Hate School, Bryan Caplan | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty
“Brad DeLong raises an important puzzle: One would have thought that the rise in the value of a sheepskin from a 30% lifetime wage premium over a high-school diploma in 1975 to a 90% premium in 2005 would have called ...”
“It is a spirit which caused people to come to Canada from every comer of the globe -- the English, the French, the men in sheepskin coats, the boat people.”
“The three guides were dressed in sheepskin, and had extra pulu gowns for use in storms to protect themselves from rain and hail.”
“January, muffled in sheepskin coat and cap, receives his bags, and goes forth alone on his terrible journey of nearly”
“What both design styles have in common is a cold heritage and, as a result, a love of warm materials like sheepskin, which is now appearing as upholstery.”
“In order to get your diploma, one of the things you have to suffer through in order to get the sheepskin is the graduation speech.”
“Even in summer the sun is none too hot on this hill-top; and a sheepskin is a garment one must be used to, it appears.”
“It comes from the sheepskin, which is worked in, slept in, and, what is more, often inherited from a parent who had also worn it as his winter hide.”
“Although this factory was known as the sheepskin tannery they soon found that the skins of lambs, kids, and goats were also tanned and finished there.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘sheepskin’.
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Curling, The Roaring Game
Terms and phrases associated with the game and sport of curling.
hack, tee, hogscore, hatch, trigger, stone, end, sweeper, broom, curling sheet, hog line, centre line and 288 more...
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color (yellow)
tiara's color lists rebuilt :)
( visual, colors, yellow, descriptive, randomness )yellow, Yellow, Cloud, Straw/Stramineous, Peach, Apricot/Ibis, Lemon, Butter, Mustard, Meline/Canary, Gold(Metallic, Web and 405 more...
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Open List: Sheepishness
Everything sheep, from Artiodactyla to zodiac.
lanolin, ram, ewe, Artiodactyla, even-toed ungulate, ruminant, Ovis aries, ovine, domestic, domesticated, neotenic, mouflon and 426 more...
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TECH - furniture
The universe as IKEA sees it.
Furniture, haberdashery, household articles and a lot more. The bulk of the list (750 entries) are IKEA articles in the original English version IKEA use...active-response c..., add-on-unit for s..., adjustable slatte..., alarm clock, alkaline battery, anti-slip socks, anti-slip underlay, armchair, armrest, artificial flower, artificial garland, artificial plant ... and 830 more...
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Reading Reading
Words from the works of Peter Reading - at least one from each (except the Schwitters-esque erosions, cut-ups etc).
overbright, pimpled, muskiness, effuse, stoup, maul, unlevel, viscid, perfidious, glibly, aloes, drouth and 449 more...
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Chromonyms
These chromonyms are defined as colors in at least one dictionary (mostly MW3). (Actually there's one fake, for reasons I'll explain someday.) They are all one-word nouns such as "kelly", which can...
absinthe, acacia, acorn, alabaster, alesan, almond, aloma, amaranth, amber, amethyst, anemone, anil and 821 more...
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End in -kin
You heard it here first. Well, maybe not first, but you heard it here. Well, maybe not "heard," but read. You read it here. At some point.
gherkin, merkin, firkin, malkin, pumpkin, bumpkin, pipkin, bodkin, napkin, mannikin, pigskin, sealskin and 83 more...
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simple & useful6
vaporize, potentiality, lamentation, finite, hobbling, whiffed, accessorizing, negligible, amplification, grumbly, trumpeting, snares and 65 more...
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PETA Hates This List
Stuff made by or from animals, which we don't eat but is still useful.
leather, ivory, pearl, ambergris, coral, musk, lanolin, wool, horsehair, mohair, pashmina, fur and 15 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for sheepskin.
yarb Suddenly the young man became aware that she was comatose on the sheepskin cover.
- Peter Reading, C, 1984 Aug 2, 2008