Library / English Dictionary

PELT

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Body covering of a living animal

Synonyms:

hide; pelt; skin

Classified under:

Nouns denoting animals

Hypernyms ("pelt" is a kind of...):

body covering (any covering for the body or a body part)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The dressed hairy coat of a mammal

Synonyms:

fur; pelt

Classified under:

Nouns denoting substances

Hypernyms ("pelt" is a kind of...):

animal skin (the outer covering of an animal)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "pelt"):

squirrel (the fur of a squirrel)

seal; sealskin (the pelt or fur (especially the underfur) of a seal)

sable (the expensive dark brown fur of the marten)

raccoon (the fur of the North American racoon)

otter (the fur of an otter)

muskrat; muskrat fur (the brown fur of a muskrat)

mink (the expensive fur of a mink)

leopard (the pelt of a leopard)

lapin; rabbit (the fur of a rabbit)

lambskin (the skin of a lamb with the wool still on)

fox (the grey or reddish-brown fur of a fox)

ermine (the expensive white fur of the ermine)

chinchilla (the expensive silvery grey fur of the chinchilla)

beaver; beaver fur (the soft brown fur of the beaver)

bearskin (the pelt of a bear (sometimes used as a rug))

astrakhan (the fur of young lambs)

 II. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Attack and bombard with or as if with missiles

Example:

pelt the speaker with questions

Synonyms:

pelt; pepper

Classified under:

Verbs of fighting, athletic activities

Hypernyms (to "pelt" is one way to...):

assail; attack (launch an attack or assault on; begin hostilities or start warfare with)

"Pelt" entails doing...:

throw (propel through the air)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody with something

Derivation:

pelter (a thrower of missiles)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Cast, hurl, or throw repeatedly with some missile

Example:

They pelted each other with snowballs

Synonyms:

bombard; pelt

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Hypernyms (to "pelt" is one way to...):

throw (propel through the air)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "pelt"):

lapidate (throw stones at)

snowball (throw snowballs at)

egg (throw eggs at)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody with something

Derivation:

pelter (a thrower of missiles)

pelting (anything happening rapidly or in quick successive)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Rain heavily

Example:

Put on your rain coat-- it's pouring outside!

Synonyms:

pelt; pour; rain buckets; rain cats and dogs; stream

Classified under:

Verbs of raining, snowing, thawing, thundering

Hypernyms (to "pelt" is one way to...):

rain; rain down (precipitate as rain)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "pelt"):

sheet (come down as if in sheets)

sluice; sluice down (pour as if from a sluice)

Sentence frame:

It is ----ing

Sentence example:

It was pelting all day long

Derivation:

pelter (a heavy rain)

Credits

 Context examples: 

During all my first sleep, I was following the windings of an unknown road; total obscurity environed me; rain pelted me; I was burdened with the charge of a little child: a very small creature, too young and feeble to walk, and which shivered in my cold arms, and wailed piteously in my ear.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

The first and the mildest course is, by keeping the island hovering over such a town, and the lands about it, whereby he can deprive them of the benefit of the sun and the rain, and consequently afflict the inhabitants with dearth and diseases: and if the crime deserve it, they are at the same time pelted from above with great stones, against which they have no defence but by creeping into cellars or caves, while the roofs of their houses are beaten to pieces.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

In the meantime, there suddenly fell such a violent shower of hail, that I was immediately by the force of it, struck to the ground: and when I was down, the hailstones gave me such cruel bangs all over the body, as if I had been pelted with tennis-balls; however, I made a shift to creep on all fours, and shelter myself, by lying flat on my face, on the lee-side of a border of lemon-thyme, but so bruised from head to foot, that I could not go abroad in ten days.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)