adj, verb ·Moderate ·High school level

Definitions

Verb

1. 1
   simple past and past participle of tail form-of, participle, past

Adjective

1. 1
   Having a tail. in-compounds, not-comparable, often

   "There are several tailed species of mammals."

2. 2
   Of certain butterflies, having one or more filamentous projections on the tornal section of each hind wing. not-comparable

Adjective

1. 1
   having a tail of a specified kind; often used in combination wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms

caudatecaudalcaudatetail

Example

More examples

"The cops tailed the suspect on foot but ended up losing him in a crowded bus station."

Etymology

From Middle English tayled; equivalent to tail + -ed.

Related phrases

African long-tailed shrikeElliot's short-tailed shrewHarlan's red-tailed hawkMajor's long-tailed tenrecSeram long-tailed mosaic-tailed ratball-tailed catband-tailed antshrikeband-tailed manakinbar-tailed godwitblack-tailed deerblack-tailed flycatcherblack-tailed godwit

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