# egg

Pronunciation: say "EG" /ɛɡ/

## Noun

1. The edible product of a domestic fowl such as a duck, goose, or especially a chicken, the shell contents of which are eaten as food.
   - Simple: A round food with a shell, laid by hens and other birds and eaten cooked or used in cooking.
   - _She cracked a fresh egg into the hot pan._
   - _The recipe calls for three eggs and a cup of milk._
2. A roughly spherical or oval body laid by birds, reptiles, insects and other animals, in which an embryo develops inside a membrane or shell if it has been fertilized.
   - Simple: A round or oval thing laid by birds, insects and reptiles, where a baby animal can grow inside.
   - _Each egg hatched after about three weeks of incubation._
   - _Female turtles return to the same beach to lay their eggs._
3. The female reproductive cell of an animal or plant; the female gamete, also called an egg cell or ovum.
   - Simple: The female sex cell of an animal or plant, which can become a new living thing after joining a male cell.
   - _Fertilization occurs when a sperm fuses with the egg._
   - _Hormone treatments can stimulate the ovaries to release several eggs._
4. An object that looks like or is shaped like an egg.
   - Simple: An object that has the rounded, oval shape of an egg.
   - _The sculpture was a giant stone egg balanced on its narrow end._
   - _He collected decorative eggs carved from jade and onyx._
7. A large or noticeable swelling on the head resulting from an injury.
   - Simple: A large bump on the head caused by being hit or knocked.
   - _A nasty egg rose on his scalp where the bat had struck him._
   - _She pressed ice against the egg forming above her eyebrow._
8. A score of zero; in cricket, a batter's failure to score any runs.
   - Simple: A score of zero, especially in a game or sport.
11. In transgender slang, a person who has not yet realized or accepted that they are transgender, or this stage of not yet knowing.
   - Simple: A slang word for a person who has not yet understood that they are transgender, or for that stage.
   - _Online forums are full of stories from people who realized, in hindsight, that they had been an egg all along._
   - _Friends quietly suspected she was an egg long before she came out._
15. A foolish or obnoxious person, often one others find tiresome to be around. *(New Zealand)*
   - Simple: A foolish or annoying person that others find unpleasant.
   - _Only an egg would brag like that in front of the whole office._
   - _She called her brother a complete egg after he spoiled the surprise._

## Verb

5. To encourage, incite, or urge someone to do something, now chiefly in the phrasal form egg on.
   - Simple: To push someone to do something, often by cheering them on or daring them.
   - _The crowd egged the boxers on with loud chants and jeers._
   - _It's easy to egg someone on when you won't face the consequences yourself._
6. To throw eggs, especially rotten ones, at someone or something.
   - Simple: To throw eggs at someone or something, often as a prank or insult.
   - _Vandals egged the storefront overnight and left the glass a mess._
   - _Angry fans tried to egg the referee as he left the field._
9. To coat a food ingredient with, or dip it in, beaten egg while preparing a dish.
   - Simple: To cover or dip a piece of food in beaten egg before cooking it.
   - _Egg the fish fillets and dredge them in seasoned flour._
   - _He egged the cutlets before pressing them into the crumb mixture._
13. To collect the eggs of wild birds, typically taken from their nests in the wild.
   - Simple: To go out and gather the eggs of wild birds, usually from their nests.
   - _Her grandfather went egging along the shore every May and came home with a basket of gull eggs._
   - _The old men remembered going egging among the island seabird colonies before the practice was outlawed._
19. To conceive a child, especially recklessly or without proper thought. *(dialectal, England)*
   - Simple: To make a baby, especially in a careless or reckless way.

## Noun

10. A person, especially a man; a fellow. *(dated)*
   - Simple: A person or fellow, especially a man.
   - _Everyone at the club agreed that the old colonel was a thoroughly good egg._
   - _Don't worry about him; he's a decent egg at heart._
12. A Twitter user shown with the egg that was the site's default profile picture until 2017, and so taken for a newcomer or an anonymous troll. *(dated)*
   - Simple: On Twitter, a user who kept the old egg-shaped default profile picture, seen as new or as a troll.
   - _The thread was swarmed by eggs parroting the same talking point._
   - _She dismissed the loudest critic as just another egg hiding behind the default picture._
14. A bomb or explosive mine, in dated military slang used during wartime. *(dated)*
   - Simple: A bomb or explosive mine, especially one dropped from an aircraft.
   - _The squadron returned to base after delivering its eggs on the railway yards._
   - _A single egg from the airship was enough to start the fire._
16. A young person, especially a child or callow youth. *(obsolete)*
   - Simple: A young or inexperienced person, especially a child.
17. The germ or seed of something, usually something harmful, at its earliest stage of development. *(archaic)*
   - Simple: Something that holds a bad thing at its very start, before it grows.
18. A white person regarded as excessively infatuated with East Asia and its cultures. *(rare)*
   - Simple: A white person who others think is far too obsessed with East Asia.

## Other meanings

- (verb) To distort the circular cross-section of something, such as a tube, into an oval or elliptical shape, whether by accident or on purpose.
- (noun) An ornamental oval molding set in a row alternating with dart or triangular shapes.
- (noun) In computer security, one of the blocks of data injected into a program's address space for use by certain shellcode, such as 'omelettes'.
- (noun) In cellular automata, a would-be spark (typically thrown off by an overweight spaceship) that ends up destroying the pattern rather than persisting.

## Origin

**Meanings 1–4, 6–19** — The noun goes back to *h₂ōwyóm, the Proto-Indo-European word for "egg," which probably came from *h₂éwis ("bird"), with the idea of an animal clothed in feathers. Through Proto-Germanic *ajją it reached Old Norse as egg, which was borrowed into Middle English as eg or egg, first in Northern England. A native English form, ey (plural eyren), from Old English ǣġ, lasted until about the 16th century, when egg fully took its place. The verb was formed from the noun.
**Meaning 5** — Proto-Indo-European *h₂eḱ- ("sharp") ultimately led to Proto-Germanic *agjō ("a corner, an edge") and to Old Norse egg ("an edge"). From that came Old Norse eggja ("to incite, egg on"), which gave Old English eggian and then Middle English eggen ("to urge on, incite, encourage").

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/egg (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).