Appaloosa

//ˌæ.pəˈluː.sə// noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A horse breed best known for its colorful spotted coat pattern. US, uncountable
  2. 2
    A catfish. Southern-US, US

    "A big fish wends its way towards the shape the light makes, stops and sucks at air. Mottled brown and black, with a pink, appaloosa mouth."

  3. 3
    Alternative form of appaloosa. alt-of, alternative
  4. 4
    a hardy breed of saddle horse developed in western North America and characteristically having a spotted rump wordnet
  5. 5
    A horse of this breed. US, countable

Synonyms

All synonyms
horsethoroughbred

Example

More examples

"A big fish wends its way towards the shape the light makes, stops and sucks at air. Mottled brown and black, with a pink, appaloosa mouth."

Etymology

Etymology 1

From a + Palouse + -a. From the phrase "a Palouse horse", referring to the Palouse River near which they were first encountered by non-Native Americans. The river is named for the Palouse region.

Etymology 2

Ellipsis of Appaloosa cat, itself an ellipsis of Apaloosa catfish, after the Appalousa people of Louisiana.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.