mongrel
pronunciation
How to pronounce mongrel in British English:
UK [ˈmʌŋgrəl]
How to pronounce mongrel in American English:
US [ˈmʌŋɡrəl, ˈmɑŋ-]
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- Noun:
- derogatory term for a variation that is not genuine; something irregular or inferior or of dubious origin
- an inferior dog or one of mixed breed
Word Origin
- mongrel
- mongrel: [15] The etymological notion underlying mongrel is of a ‘mixture’. For the word goes back ultimately to the prehistoric Germanic base *mong- ‘mix’, which also produced English among and mingle [14].=> among, mingle
- mongrel (n.)
- late 15c., "mixed-breed dog," from obsolete mong "mixture," from Old English gemong "mingling" (base of among), from Proto-Germanic *mangjan "to knead together" (see mingle). With pejorative suffix -rel. Meaning "person not of pure race" is from 1540s. As an adjective from 1570s.
Synonym
Example
- 1. The only reason of the attack - he 's a mongrel .
- 2. Her parents had last seen the three-year-old playing in the backyard with the small black mongrel .
- 3. Let 's start with a smallest possible example of a rack application , using mongrel .
- 4. But in a dense network of production , every product is a mongrel , with an indecipherable pedigree .
- 5. Many chinese will take no less kindly to being told the tiger is an undistinguished mongrel , and that miscegenation is the way forward .