blue whale
English
Illustration of an adult blue whale alongside a human for size reference.
Noun
blue whale (plural blue whales)
- A whale (Balaenoptera musculus), blue in color and the largest known living animal.
- 1851, Herman Melville, Moby Dick, page 131:
- But there are a rabble of uncertain, fugitive half-fabulous whales, which as an American whaleman, I know by reputation, but not personally....the Iceberg whale; the Quog Whale; the Blue Whale. But I omit them as altogether obsolete and can hardly help suspecting them for mere sounds full of leviathanism, but signifying nothing.
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Synonyms
- sulfur-bottom whale
- sulphur bottom whale
Translations
a whale, Balaenoptera musculus
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