Definitions

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

  • noun Any of numerous chiefly marine invertebrates of the phylum Mollusca, typically having a soft unsegmented body, a mantle, and a protective calcareous shell, and including the snails, clams, and squids.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A soft-bodied animal, usually with an external shell; a member of the Mollusca in any sense. See Mollusca.

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

  • noun (Zoöl.) One of the Mollusca.

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

  • noun US Alternative spelling of mollusc.

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

  • noun invertebrate having a soft unsegmented body usually enclosed in a shell

Etymologies

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

[French mollusque, from New Latin Mollusca, phylum name, from neuter pl. of Latin molluscus, thin-shelled, from mollis, soft; see mel- in Indo-European roots.]

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Examples

  • Perched above the smoggy city, this giant mollusk is home to Magali and Fernando Mayorga and their two sons Allan and Josh.

    The Nautilus – Giant Snail-Shaped Home Fit for a Family | Inhabitat 2009

  • Casillas raised a red and yellow carton cutout of Octopus Paul, the mollusk from the German zoo that predicted

    Columnist: Stephen Miller 2010

  • The mollusk is the venerable grandfather, the chief of the house, the creator of the dynasty, the ancestor crowned with a nobility of millions of centuries.

    The Dead Command From the Spanish Los Muertos Mandan Vicente Blasco Ib����ez 1897

  • A mollusk is a cheap edition {of man} with a suppression of the costlier illustrations, designed for dingy circulation, for shelving in an oyster-bank or among the seaweed.

    Errata: The Wordie Blog 2009

  • For example, if I had added the keyword "mollusk" to at least one of my linked posts about barnacles living on snail shells, then the searcher who used the phrase "barnacle mollusk symbiosis" would probably have found them.

    How to help searchers find what they are looking for AYDIN 2008

  • For example, if I had added the keyword "mollusk" to at least one of my linked posts about barnacles living on snail shells, then the searcher who used the phrase "barnacle mollusk symbiosis" would probably have found them.

    Archive 2008-03-01 AYDIN 2008

  • In addition, they are the number one harvested mollusk, meaning their presence is important economically for the seafood industry.

    Newswise: Latest News 2010

  • Ammonites were a kind of mollusk, a squidlike creature that lived in a chambered shell.

    billingsgazette.com 2009

  • In an 1872 paper, he identified the circular imprints as "small ovate fossils" of some unknown Precambrian organism - perhaps a kind of mollusk - and sketched a picture of the find.

    Dose.ca Music briefs 2009

  • In an 1872 paper, he identified the circular imprints as "small ovate fossils" of some unknown Precambrian organism - perhaps a kind of mollusk - and sketched a picture of the find.

    Dose.ca Music briefs 2009

Comments

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  • See clam.

    October 11, 2007

  • A mollusk is a cheap edition of man with a suppression of the costlier illustrations, designed for dingy circulation, for shelving in an oyster-bank or among the seaweed.

    --Ralph Waldo Emerson, circa 1870, Power and Laws of Thought

    November 8, 2007

  • . . . the rich and interesting delineations of the zoophytes and mollusks are very new and striking.

    --J. Pinkerton, 1811, Petralogy. A Treatise on Rocks vol. I, p. 453.

    Antedates OED entry from 1832.

    February 27, 2009

  • Usage on ecodog.

    July 28, 2009

  • mollusk doorknob.

    August 17, 2012