ˈmusk-rat
1. a. A large acquatic rodent, Fiber zibethicus, common throughout N. America, so called from its musky smell. Also called musquash and ondatra.
| 1620 Observ. Silkwormes D 2 b, Muske Rats skins, two shillings a dozen: the cods of them will serue for good perfumes. 1714 Lawson Hist. Carolina 120 Musk Rats frequent fresh Streams and no other; as the Bever does. He has a Cod of Musk, which is valuable, as is likewise his Fur. 1892 W. Pike North. Canada 25 Musk-rats swam in all the little creeks and lakes. |
b. U.S. A nickname for the inhabitants of low-lying districts,
esp. the
St. Clair Flats (Michigan).
| 1845 in C. Cist Cincinnati Misc. 240 The inhabitants of..Delaware [are called] Muskrats. 1857 in Archiv Stud. neu. Spr. XXII. 162 (citing Atlantis II. 645). 1890 Century Mag. July 369/2 Her grandmother..having a profound contempt for the ‘muskrats’ as the Flats people are generally called. |
c. The fur or skin of the musk-rat.
| 1879 Encycl. Brit. IX. 838/2 Musk-Rat.—A well-known fur in North America. 1902 Scotsman 3 Jan. 7/5 Musk-rat is the least costly, being worth only about 2d. |
2. Applied to other rat-like animals having a musky odour.
a. In India and Sri Lanka (Ceylon), the shrews
Crocidura murina and
C. cærulea.
b. The
desman.
c. The
pilori (
cf. musk-cavy).
d. A viverrine quadruped, the South African genet,
Genetta felina (in recent Dicts.).
e. The musk-kangaroo,
Hypsiprymnodon moschatus.
| 1681 R. Knox Hist. Ceylon 31 They have a sort of Rats, they call Musk-Rats, because they smell strong of Musk. 1774 Goldsm. Nat. Hist. (1824) II. 92 The musk rat. Of these animals of the rat kind, but with a musky smell, there are also three distinctions..; the Ondatra, the Desman, and the Pilori. 1785 Gentl. Mag. LV. i. 204 A little animal, very frequent in these parts, totally unknown I believe, to other countries. It is called here [Russia] the Musk-rat. 1813 J. Forbes Orient. Mem. I. 41 The musk-rats [at Bombay]..have a most disagreeable smell. 1836 [see pilori]. 1884 R. A. Sterndale Mamm. India & Ceylon 83 Sorex cærulescens. The common Musk Shrew, better known as Musk⁓rat. 1892 J. D. Ogilby Catal. Austral. Mamm. 38 Hypsiprymnodon moschatus Ramsay (1876). Australian Musk Rat. |
3. attrib.:
musk-rat burrow,
musk-rat cap,
musk-rat skin,
musk-rat study;
musk-rat house, the ‘house’ or burrow of the American musk-rat;
musk-rat weed, a tall American meadow-plant,
Thalictrum polygamum (formerly
T. Cornuti).
| 1870 Amer. Naturalist IV. 385 This fish, when the bank was carelessly approached, would withdraw to a deserted muskrat burrow. 1916 C. A. Eastman From Deep Woods to Civilization 101 We saw that they were colored troopers, wearing buffalo overcoats and muskrat caps. 1962 W. Stegner Wolf Willow iii. iii. 230 Crouching in the trench in his muskrat cap, he looked like some digging animal. |
| 1837 W. Irving Capt. Bonneville I. 277 They found the swamp full of ‘muskrat houses’. 1939 Beaver June 10 Older men remembered when the muskrat houses had been so thick that the marsh looked like a hayfield in coils. 1962 W. Stegner Wolf Willow iii. ii. 150 They had seen muskrat houses built six feet high in the sloughs—and when the rats built high you could depend on a hard winter. |
| 1642 in Archives of Maryland (1887) iv. 99, 2. musk-rat skins. 1796 E. P. Simcoe Diary (1911) 315 We..slept well,..but the smell of musk-rat skins..was disagreeable. 1823 in T. L. McKenney Memoirs (1846) I. App. 296 Furs and other articles..to wit,..2,500 muskrat skins, [etc.]. |
| 1939 Amer. Midland Naturalist XXI. 514 (title) Central Wisconsin muskrat study. |
| 1897–8 Britton & Brown Amer. Flora, Muskrat weed, Thalictrum polygamum. |