sea horse

See also: seahorse

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Middle English sehors (“walrus”), equivalent to sea +‎ horse. Probably a calque of obsolete French cheval de mer or directly of Late Latin caballus marinus.

Pronunciation

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Noun

sea horse (plural sea horses)

  1. Any of the small marine fish of the genus Hippocampus that have a horselike head and swim upright.
  2. (obsolete) The walrus.
    • 1789, Olaudah Equiano, chapter 9, in The Interesting Narrative, volume I:
      One morning we had vast quantities of sea-horses about the ship, which neighed exactly like any other horses.
  4. (mythology) Synonym of hippocampus.
    • 2013, Richard Daniel De Puma, Etruscan Art in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, page 107:
      Instead, it seems to be a unique case that ends in the tail of a hippocamp or seahorse, although with one fin now missing. Ultimately, the form might have been inspired by bent-leg vases produced in Greece.
  5. (philately) Any of a series of high-value British stamps issued during the reign of King George V, featuring a depiction of Britannia on a chariot in choppy seas.
  6. (obsolete) A hippopotamus.
    • 1830, Georges Louis Le Clerc (Count de Buffon), The Natural History of Quadrupeds (page 331)
      As most authors mention the hippopotamus under the names of the sea-horse, or the sea-cow, he has sometimes been confounded with the latter, which inhabits only the northern seas.
    • 1857, Journal of the Society of Arts, volume 5, page 72:
      The sea-horse teeth (so called) are the tusks of the hippopotamus.

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