bunny
English
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA(key): /ˈbʌni/
Audio (UK) (file) - Rhymes: -ʌni
- Hyphenation: bun‧ny
Etymology 1
From bun (“rabbit”) + -y. Probably from Scottish Gaelic bun (“bottom, butt, stump, stub”), from Old Irish bun (“the thick end of anything, base, butt, foot”), from Proto-Celtic *bonus, though its origin is uncertain. Together with rabbit, bunny has largely displaced its former rhyme cony (see cony for more).
Noun
bunny (plural bunnies)
- A rabbit, especially a juvenile.
- A bunny girl: a nightclub waitress who wears a costume having rabbit ears and tail.
- 1969, Doris Lessing, The Four-Gated City, Flamingo 1993 edition, page 578:
- ‘Gwen has a job as a bunny because says she's sick of sex.’
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- (sports) In basketball, an easy shot (i.e., one right next to the bucket) that is missed.
Derived terms
- angst bunny
- badge bunny
- beach bunny
- beans bunny
- blushing bunny
- bridge bunny
- buckle bunny
- bunny boiler
- bunny-boiler
- bunny-boiling
- bunny boot
- bunny buster
- bunny chow
- bunny dip
- bunny ears
- bunny girl
- bunny grass
- bunny-hop
- bunny hop
- bunny-hug
- bunny hug
- bunny hunt
- bunny mother
- bunny rabbit
- bunny ranch
- bunny rat
- bunny slope
- bunny suit
- bunny wunny
- chubby bunny
- cuddle bunny
- cuddle-bunny
- dumb bunny
- Duracell bunny
- dust bunny
- Easter Bunny
- Energizer bunny
- fluff bunny
- fluffy bunny
- fuck bunny
- gym bunny
- happy bunny
- honey bunny
- jungle bunny
- pink bunny
- Playboy Bunny, Playboy bunny
- plot bunny
- puck bunny
- puck-bunny
- rope bunny
- ski bunny
- slope bunny
- snow bunny
- snuggle-bunny
- snuggle bunny
- Stanford bunny
- sun bunny
- sun-bunny
- that's the bunny
Translations
young rabbit
|
women in a costume of rabbit ears and tail
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Adjective
bunny (comparative bunnier, superlative bunniest)
- (skiing) Easy or unchallenging.
- Let’s start on the bunny slope.
- 2014, Carey Heywood, Sawyer Says: A Companion Novel to Him and Her, →ISBN:
- We are on the bunniest of bunny hills. I've fallen no fewer than six times and I love every minute of it.
Synonyms
- (easy or unchallenging): nursery
Etymology 2
From Middle English bony, boni (“swelling, tumor”), from Old French bugne, buigne (“swelling, lump”), from Old Frankish *bungjo (“swelling, bump”), from Proto-Germanic *bungô, *bunkô (“lump, clump, heap, crowd”). More at bunion, bunch.
Alternative forms
- bunney, bonie
Noun
bunny (plural bunnies)
- (UK dialectal) A swelling from a blow; a bump.
- (mining) A sudden enlargement or mass of ore, as opposed to a vein or lode.
Etymology 3
From Middle English bune (“hollow stalk or stem, drinking straw”), from Old English bune (“cup, beaker, drinking vessel; reed, cane”), of unknown origin. Related to English bun, boon (“the stalk of flax or hemp less the fibre”), Scots bune, boon, been, see bun, boon. Compare also bunweed.
Noun
bunny (plural bunnies)
- (UK dialectal) A culvert or short covered drain connecting two ditches.
- (UK dialectal) A chine or gully formed by water running over the edge of a cliff; a wooded glen or small ravine opening through the cliff line to the sea.
- 1983, Geoffrey Morley, Smuggling in Hampshire and Dorset, 1700-1850 (page 72)
- Friar's Cliff and Highcliffe have always been what the second name suggests: cliffs too high to scale easily and with no convenient bunnies, chines or combes.
- 1983, Geoffrey Morley, Smuggling in Hampshire and Dorset, 1700-1850 (page 72)
- (UK dialectal) Any small drain or culvert.
- (UK dialectal) A brick arch or wooden bridge, covered with earth across a drawn or carriage in a water-meadow, just wide enough to allow a hay-wagon to pass over.
- (UK dialectal) A small pool of water.
Noun
bunny (plural bunnies)
- (South Africa) Bunny chow; a snack of bread filled with curry.
- 2008, Steve Pike, Surfing South Africa, page 258:
- Surfers from Durban grew up on bunnies. You get the curry in the bread with the removed square chunk, used to dunk back in the curry.
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Etymology 5
From bun (“small bread roll”) + -y.
Adjective
bunny (comparative more bunny or bunnier, superlative most bunny or bunniest)
- (rare, humorous) Resembling a bun (small bread roll). [since the 1960s, but always rare]
- 2012, Sue Simkins, Cooking With Mrs Simkins, →ISBN:
- If you would like to make some buns with more of a Chelsea bunlike texture follow the recipe above, but increase the flour to 300g (11oz). This will make them less rich and more 'bunny'.
- 2014, Bruce Montague, Wedding Bells and Chimney Sweeps, →ISBN:
- Before the interregnum, the cakes made for weddings had been pathetic offerings, consisting mainly of piles of biscuits and scones. When you read the list of ingredients -- sugar, eggs, milk, flour, currents, and spices -- these must have looked and tasted a lot like hot cross buns, but without being hot, without the cross, and without being particularly bunny.
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Synonyms
- (resembling a bun): bunlike