Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Any of various warm-blooded vertebrate animals of the class Mammalia, including humans, characterized by a covering of hair on the skin and, in the female, milk-producing mammary glands for nourishing the young.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Having breasts or teats; mammiferous.
  • noun An animal of the class Mammalia.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Zoöl.) One of the Mammalia.
  • noun See under Age, n., 8.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun An animal of the class Mammalia, characterized by being warm-blooded, having hair and feeding milk to its young.
  • noun paleontology A vertebrate with three bones in the inner ear and one in the jaw.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun any warm-blooded vertebrate having the skin more or less covered with hair; young are born alive except for the small subclass of monotremes and nourished with milk

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[From Late Latin mammālis, of the breast, from Latin mamma, breast; see mā- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Modern Latin Mammalia, coined 1758 by Linnaeus for the class of mammals, from neuter plural of Late Latin mammalis ("of the breast"), from Latin mamma ("breast"), perhaps cognate with mamma (mother).

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Examples

  • Also the term mammal contains much more definitional weight than just "anything that has hair and is endothermic" there's the whole vertebrate thing and air breathing is right up there as well as living etc etc.

    Telic Thoughts 2009

  • The same sort of thing was true for the term mammal in the beginning.

    Telic Thoughts 2009

  • Monotremes defy the English word mammal, which implies breasts, or at least nipples.

    Archive 2006-09-01 2006

  • Monotremes defy the English word mammal, which implies breasts, or at least nipples.

    Monotremata 2006

  • For over two decades, I've been studying and writing about cetaceans, those whale and dolphin mammal cousins whose brain size, close-knit family societies, and communication skills rival our own.

    Brenda Peterson: Japan: Stop Killing Our Evolutionary Elders and Help Save Our Oceans Brenda Peterson 2010

  • For over two decades, I've been studying and writing about cetaceans, those whale and dolphin mammal cousins whose brain size, close-knit family societies, and communication skills rival our own.

    Brenda Peterson: Japan: Stop Killing Our Evolutionary Elders and Help Save Our Oceans Brenda Peterson 2010

  • For over two decades, I've been studying and writing about cetaceans, those whale and dolphin mammal cousins whose brain size, close-knit family societies, and communication skills rival our own.

    Brenda Peterson: Japan: Stop Killing Our Evolutionary Elders and Help Save Our Oceans Brenda Peterson 2010

  • An ambassador for his imperiled species, the playful 12-year-old marine mammal is curious and energetic.

    Man-manatee alliance pools $1.5M annually 2008

  • Bumblebee bat - World's smallest mammal is endangered in Thailand where it is known from a single national park.

    Archive 2007-01-01 2007

  • The act contains certain conditions for "exempt hunting" that allow the killing of wild mammals with the aid of dogs — if "as soon as possible after being found or flushed out the wild mammal is shot dead by a competent person."

    Masters of the Hunt P. J. O'Rourke 2005

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