Bovine

//ˈboʊˌvaɪn// adj, noun

adj, noun ·Common ·High school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    An animal of the family, subfamily, tribe, or genera including cattle, buffaloes and bison.

    "Near-synonyms: cattle beast, cattlebeast, cow"

  2. 2
    any of various members of the genus Bos wordnet
Adjective
  1. 1
    Of, relating to, or characteristic of cattle. not-comparable
  2. 2
    Belonging to the subfamily Bovinae. not-comparable
  3. 3
    Sluggish, dull, slow-witted. figuratively

    "They had been selected and arranged with a dull, bovine indifference to any meaning that any of them might have."

Adjective
  1. 1
    dull and slow-moving and stolid; like an ox wordnet
  2. 2
    of or relating to or belonging to the genus Bos (cattle) wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
dullasinineaurochsbeefbeef cattlebeef-brained

Example

More examples

"I'm not an expert on bovine anatomy, but I think they have four stomachs."

Etymology

PIE word *gʷṓws Borrowed from Late Latin bovīnus (“relating to cattle”), from Latin bōs (“ox”). Cognate to beef.

Related phrases

Bovine alphaherpesvirus 1Bovine alphaherpesvirus 2Bovine alphaherpesvirus 5Bovine atadenovirus DBovine coronavirusBovine cyclovirusBovine fever ephemerovirusBovine foamy virusBovine gammaherpesvirus 4Bovine gammaherpesvirus 6Bovine herpesvirus 1Bovine herpesvirus 5

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