Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Vulture |
VultureNoun1. Any of various large diurnal birds of prey having naked heads and weak claws and feeding chiefly on carrion. 2. Someone who attacks in search of booty. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "vulture" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1532. (references) |
Etymology: Vulture \Vul"ture\, noun. [from Old English expression vultur, from Latin expression vultur: compare to Old French expression voltour, French vautour.]. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
Bible | Vulture (1.) Heb. da'ah (Lev. 11:14). In the parallel passage (Deut. 14:13) the Hebrew word used is _ra'ah_, rendered "glede;" LXX., "gups;" Vulg., "milvus." A species of ravenous bird, distinguished for its rapid flight. "When used without the epithet 'red,' the name is commonly confined to the black kite. The habits of the bird bear out the allusion in Isa. 34:15, for it is, excepting during the winter three months, so numerous everywhere in Palestine as to be almost gregarious." (See EAGLE.) (2.) In Job 28:7 the Heb. 'ayyah is thus rendered. The word denotes a clamorous and a keen-sighted bird of prey. In Lev. 11:14 and Deut. 14:13 it is rendered "kite" (q.v.). Source: Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
Vultures are scavenging birds, feeding mostly from carcasses of dead animals. Vultures are found in every continent.A particular characteristic of many vultures is a bald head, devoid of feathers. This is likely because a feathered head would become spattered with blood and other fluids, and thus be difficult to keep clean.
Vultures fall into two groups. The Old World vultures belong to the family Accipitridae, which also includes eagles, Kitess, buzzards and hawks. These are found in Africa, Asia and Europe. They find carcasses exclusively by sight.
New World vultures and Condors are not at all closely related to the superficially similar Accipitridae, but belong in the family Cathartidae. They have a good sense of smell, unusual for a raptor.
The similarities between the two groups are due to convergent evolution rather than a close relationship.
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Vulture."
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
The Vulture is a fictional villain in Spider-Man. The Vulture (Adrian Toomes) is a former electronics engineer who employs a special harness that allows him to fly. The harness also endowed him with enhanced strength and served to increase his longevity. The harness was an invention that he stole.
- Name: Adrian Toomes
- Hieght: 5'11"
- Wieght: 175 lbs.
- Eyes: Hazel
- Hair: Bald
- Intelligence Level: Gifted
- Strength Level: Variable up to enhanced human
- Endurance Level: Normal
- Stamina Level: Variable up to peak human
- Reflexes Level: Normal
- Speed Level: Winged Flight Limit
- Agility Level: Normal
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Vulture (comics)."
Synonyms: VultureSynonyms: marauder (n), predator (n). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Evil doer | Cannibal; anthropophagus, anthropophagist; bloodsucker, vampire, ogre, ghoul, gorilla, vulture; gyrfalcon, gerfalcon. |
Severity | Tyrant, disciplinarian, precisian, martinet, stickler, bashaw, despot, hard master, Draco, oppressor, inquisitor, extortioner, harpy, vulture; accipitres, birds of prey, raptorials, raptors. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Vulture |
| English words defined with "vulture": Andean condor ♦ black vulture ♦ carrion crow, Coragyps atratus ♦ Egyptian vulture ♦ genus Sarcorhamphus, Gier-eagle, griffon, griffon vulture, Grype, Gyps fulvus ♦ king vulture ♦ Neophron percnopterus ♦ Pharaoh's chicken ♦ Ravener ♦ Sarcorhamphus, Sarcorhamphus papa ♦ turkey buzzard ♦ Urubu ♦ Vultur gryphus, Vulturism ♦ Zopilote. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "vulture": Aboulomri ♦ GOSSIP, Gyrfalcon, Gerfalcon ♦ Misers ♦ Nesr ♦ vulture capitalist, Vultures. (references) |
| Etymologies containing "vulture": stork. (references) |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | Hey, man, if we don't get The Vulture by midnight, it's curtains for Peter (The Monkees; writing credit: Dee Caruso; Gerald Gardner) Goebbels, hopping from one foot to another like a-- like a schoolboy. Bormann hmph a vulture, perched in the corner, watching, listening, never speaking (The Eagle Has Landed; writing credit: Jack Higgins; Tom Mankiewicz) You read the profit and loss statements like a vulture, and you play the stock market like a fox, but you store your nuts away like a squirrel (Good Morning... and Goodbye!; writing credit: Jack Moran) | |
Movie/TV Titles | The Vulture (1966) Terremoto nel Vulture (1930) The Grey Vulture (1926) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title | ||
Books | |||
Periodicals |
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Music |
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Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit | Thumbnail | Description & Credit |
 | Far shot of Vulture in flight. Lakeview District. Credit: Terry Spivey. |  | Turkey Vulture in flight. Credit: John Craig. |
 | "Business revival" hatchet threatening "Depression" vulture. Credit: Library of Congress. |  | Uncle Sam beating off "dope peddler", "bandit", and "white slaver" vultures from brood of the vulture, "prohibition". Credit: Library of Congress. |
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
| Title | Author | Quote |
Les Miserables | Hugo, Victor | Babblings of geese against a vulture! But was this G__ a vulture |
Walden | Thoreau, Henry David | We are cheered when we observe the vulture feeding on the carrion which disgusts and disheartens us, and deriving health and strength from the repast |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| "Vulture" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 96.33% of the time. "Vulture" is used about 109 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 96.33% | 105 | 31,781 |
| Noun (proper) | 1.83% | 2 | 245,945 |
| Lexical Verb (base form) | 0.92% | 1 | 339,140 |
| Noun (common) | 0.92% | 1 | 339,140 |
| Total | 100.00% | 109 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
| The following table summarizes names derived from the word "vulture". | |||
| Name | Gender | Language | Meaning |
| Aiah | N/A | Biblical | Vulture |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references.
| |||
Expressions using "vulture": bearded vulture ♦ black vulture ♦ California vulture ♦ Eagle vulture ♦ egyptian vulture ♦ griffin vulture ♦ griffon vulture ♦ king vulture ♦ new World vulture ♦ old World vulture ♦ turkey vulture ♦ vulture capitalist ♦ vulture fund. Additional references. | |
| Hyphenated Usage | |
Beginning with "vulture": vulture-investors, vulture-like. | |
Ending with "vulture": culture-vulture. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Language | Translations for "vulture"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Afrikaans | gier, aasvoël. (various references) | |
Albanian | hutë (owl, screech owl), grabitqar (predacious, predator, predatory, rapacious, raptorial, ravenous, wolfish), gjyp. (various references) | |
Arabic | نسر (eagle), طائر الرحمة, شخص جشع. (various references) | |
Bulgarian | хищник (cormorant, grabber, hawk, predator, prowler), лешояд. (various references) | |
Chinese | 雕. (various references) | |
Czech | sup. (various references) | |
Danish | sjakalinvesteringsforening (vulture fund), munkegrib (black vulture), lammegrib (bearded vulture, lammergeier), gribbeinvesteringsforening (vulture fund), gaasegrib (griffon vulture), aadselgrib (Egyptian vulture). (various references) | |
Dutch | aasgier (Egyptian vulture). (various references) | |
Esperanto | vulturo, kadavrogrifo. (various references) | |
Faeroese | gripur, gammur. (various references) | |
Farsi | کرکس(ج.ش.), لاشخورصفت , حریص (Avaricious, Avid, Fierce, Greedy, Hungry, Perfervid, Voracious). (various references) | |
Finnish | korppikotka. (various references) | |
French | vautour. (various references) | |
German | Geier (griffon, vultures), Aasgeier (scavenger). (various references) | |
Greek | όρνιο (griffin vulture, jay walker), γύπασ, γύπας. (various references) | |
Hebrew | עיט (bird of prey, eagle), "י" (falcon, hawk, kestrel, kite). (various references) | |
Hungarian | keselyû, keselyű. (various references) | |
Icelandic | gammur. (various references) | |
Italian | avvoltoio (hawk). (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | 禿鷹 , 兀鷹 (condor). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | は'たか (condor). (various references) | |
Korean | 독수리 (Eagle). (various references) | |
Manx | ushag chonvayrtagh. (various references) | |
Maya | choom. (various references) | |
Papago | nuwiopa (black vulture), nuwi (turkey vulture). (various references) | |
Pig Latin | ulturevay.(various references) | |
Portuguese | abutre (griffon). (various references) | |
Romanian | vultur (eagle), persoanã hrãpãreaţã (grabber). (various references) | |
Russian | ястреб (hawk, skyhawk), стервятник (egyptian vulture, neophron), гриф (fingerboard, finger-board, griffin). (various references) | |
Scottish | amach. (various references) | |
Sepedi | lenong. (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | sup, strvinar, lešinar, grabljivac (grabber, harpy). (various references) | |
Shona | gora. (various references) | |
Spanish | buitre. (various references) | |
Sranan | opete. (various references) | |
Swazi | lî-ngcé. (various references) | |
Swedish | gam. (various references) | |
Turkish | akbaba. (various references) | |
Ukrainian | яструб (hawk), хижак (predator, wolf). (various references) | |
Welsh | fwltur. (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Sumerian | 3100 BCE-2500 BCE | anzud. (various references) |
| Latin | 500 BCE-Modern | Accipitridae, Aegypius monachus, Coragyps atratus, Gypaetus barbatus, Gyps fulvus, Neophron percnopterus, ossifraga, RM:tschess barbet, RM:tschess cularin, RM:tschess dal chapitsch, RM:tschess egipzian, Sarcoramphus papa, voltur, vultur, vultur, voltur, vulturius, volturius, vulturem, vulturius. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Language | Date | Source | Leviticus Chapter 11, Verse 18 |
| Greek (transliterated) | 250 BC | Septuagint | Kai porfuriwna kai pelekana kai kuknon |
| Latin | 405 | Vulgate | Cycnum et onocrotalum et porphirionem |
| Middle English | 1395 | Wyclif | A swan, a cormaraunt, and a pellicane; |
| Renaissance English | 1526 | Tyndale | The backe, the pellicane, the pye, |
| Jacobean English | 1611 | King James | And the swan, and the pelican, and the gier eagle, |
| Victorian English | 1833 | Webster | And the swan, and the pelican, and the gier-eagle, |
| Basic English | 1964 | Ogden | And the water-hen and the pelican and the vulture; |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Language | Leviticus Chapter 11, Verse 18 |
| Bulgarian | лебедът, пеликанът, лешоядът, |
| Cebuano | Ug ang kalamon, ug ang pelicano, ug ang langgam nga mananagit, |
| Chinese | ' 鴟 、 鵜 鶘 、 禿 鵰 、 |
| Croatian | labud, pelikan, droplja; |
| Danish | Tinsjemetfuglen,Pelikanen, Ådselgribben, |
| Dutch | En de kauw, en de roerdomp, en de pelikaan, |
| Finnish | sarvipöllö, pelikaani ja likakorppikotka, |
| French | le cygne, le pélican et le cormoran; |
| German | die Fledermaus, die Rohrdommel, |
| Haitian Creole | gwo kanna mawon blan, grangozye, chwèt, |
| Hungarian | A bölömbika, a pelikán és a gém. |
| Indonesian-Terjemahan Lama | dan burung pong dan enggang dan banga, |
| Italian | il cigno, il pellicano, la folaga, |
| Maori | Me te wani, me te perikana, me te kia ekara, |
| Norwegian | og nattravnen og pelikanen og gribben |
| Portuguese | o porfirião, o pelicano, o abutre, |
| Rumanian | lebqda, pelicanul wi corbul de mare; |
| Russian | МЕ'Е"С, ЕМЙЛБОБ Й УЙ Б, |
| Swedish | tinsemetfågeln, pelikanen, |
| Ukrainian | і лебедя, і пелікана, і сича, |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "vulture": vultures. (additional references) | |
| |
"Vulture" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: Bulture, fulture, kulture, Kulturen, multure, ulture, Valtre, vilstrup, volure, voulture. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "vulture" (pronounced vu"lkher) |
| 4 | -u" l kh er | culture. |
| 3 | -l kh er | agriculture, Aquaculture, Belcher, counterculture, horticulture, subculture, Welcher. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "e-l-r-t-u-u-v" | |
-2 letters: vertu. | |
-3 letters: lure, lute, rule, true, tule, vert. | |
-4 letters: let, leu, lev, luv, ret, rev, rue, rut, tel, ulu, vet. | |
-5 letters: el, er, et, re, ut. | |
| Words containing the letters "e-l-r-t-u-u-v" | |
+1 letter: vultures. | |
+2 letters: vulturine. | |
+3 letters: aviculture. | |
+4 letters: avicultures, pulverulent, vasculature, ventriculus, venturously, viniculture, viticulture. | |
+5 letters: diverticulum, silviculture, superovulate, sylviculture, vasculatures, vinicultures, viticultures, voluptuaries. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Usage: Commercial 6. Images: Slideshow 7. Images: Photo Album 8. Quotations: Fiction | 9. Usage Frequency 10. Names: Derived from 11. Expressions 12. Expressions: Internet | 13. Translations: Modern 14. Translations: Ancient 15. Bible Trace 16. Derivations | 17. Rhymes 18. Anagrams 19. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
