Shell-like

adj, noun, slang

adj, noun, slang ·Uncommon ·College level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The ear. Australia, British, especially, slang

    "Can I have a quick word in your shell-like, when you've got a moment?"

Adjective
  1. 1
    Having a similar shape to a seashell.
  2. 2
    Of the external ear, resembling the graceful convolutions of a seashell. dated, literary

    ""Nay, speak not so hastily; consider well the point; take me feature by feature, forgetting not my form, and my hands and feet, and my hair, and the whiteness of my skin, and then tell me truly, hast thou ever known a woman who in aught, ay, in one little portion of her beauty, in the curve of an eyelash even, or the modelling of a shell-like ear, is justified to hold a light before my loveliness?""

Synonyms

All synonyms
earearballshell

Example

More examples

"Comets do not always have tails. They develop a fuzzy, shell-like cloud called a coma, and one, two, or three tails when near the sun."

Etymology

From shell + -like.

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