mammoth, n. and a.
(ˈmæməθ)
Also 8 mammuth, mamant, maman, mamont, mammon, mammot, (mammoht), 8–9 mammouth.
[a. Russian † mammot, whence mammotovoi kost mammoth's bones (Ludolf Gram. Russ. 1696, p. 92); now mamant. Hence also F. mammouth, † mamant, † mammont. The word is of obscure origin; the alleged Tartar word mama ‘earth’ (usually cited as the etymon) is not known to exist.]
A. n.
1. a. A large extinct species of elephant (Elephas primigenius) formerly native in Europe and northern Asia; its remains are frequently found in the alluvial deposits in Siberia.
| [1698 tr. Ludolf in A. Brand's Emb. Muscovy into China 122 The Mammotovoy, which is dug out of the Earth in Siberia.] 1706 tr. Ides' Trav. vi. 26 The old Siberian Russians affirm that the Mammuth is very like the Elephant. 1738 tr. Strahlenberg's Descr. Russia xiii. 403 The Russian Mammoth certainly came from the word Behemot. 1763 J. Bell Trav. Asia II. 148 Tartars.. have seen this creature, called mammon, at the dawn of day, near lakes and rivers. Ibid., That kind of ivory called, in this country, mammon's horn. 1807 J. Barlow Columb. i. 705 Where mammoth grazed the renovating groves. 1824 Byron Def. Transf. iii. i. 55 'Twas sport..To go forth, with a pine For a spear, 'gainst the mammoth. 1863 A. C. Ramsay Phys. Geog. xxviii. (1878) 463 Man, the Mammoth, and other extinct mammalia, were contemporaneous. |
b. attrib. and Comb., as mammoth horn, mammoth ivory, mammoth tusk; mammoth-wise adv.
| 1843 Zoologist I. 2 By the name of mammoth horns the Siberians designate the fossil tusks which are so numerous..throughout the northern districts. 1868 Swinburne Blake 247 The spinal skeleton,..shaped mammoth-wise, in grovelling involution of limb. 1879 Lubbock Sci. Lect. v. 150 A fragment of mammoth-tusk. 1903 Expositor June 460 Wrought objects of mammoth ivory. |
c. U.S. Often applied to the fossil mastodon.
| 1816 J. Scott Vis. Paris (ed. 5) 296 The Siberian Mammoth, or Elephant, and the American Mammoth, or Mastodonton. 1834 McMurtrie Cuvier's Anim. Kingd. 98 The Mammoth has been completely destroyed... Its remains are found..throughout all parts of North America. 1850 Lyell 2nd Visit U.S. II. 197 The fossil remains of the mammoth (a name commonly applied in the United States to the mastodon). |
2. fig. Something of huge size (cf. B).
| 1894 Cornh. Mag. Mar. 269 Bayle's ‘Dictionnaire Historique’, 5 vols. folio, or any kindred mammoth among books. |
B. adj. a. Comparable to the mammoth in size; huge, gigantic.
Freq. in American usage before 1850. The reference in quots. 18022 and 1803 is to a large cheese presented to Jefferson.
| 1802 Port Folio (Philadelphia) II. 31 (Th.), A baker in this city offers Mammoth bread for sale. 1802 Balance (Hudson, N.Y.) 19 Oct. 331 (Th.), No more to do with the subject than the man in the moon has to do with the mammoth cheese. 1803 J. Davis Trav. U.S.A. ix. 329 Its extraordinary dimensions induced some wicked wag of a federalist to call it the Mammoth Cheese. 1813 Niles' Reg. IV. 32/2 The Mammoth bank bill passed the senate this day on a third reading. 1814 Sir R. Wilson Priv. Diary II. 309 The dancing very bad; the performers all had mammoth legs. 1820 Keats Hyperion i. 164 But one of the whole mammoth-brood still kept His sovereignty. 1822 J. Flint Lett. Amer. 309 note, The great cave in Kentucky is called the Mammoth Cave, although none of the remains of that animal have been found in it. 1850 Scoresby Cheever's Whalem. Adv. iii. (1859) 36 The whale was thus got hold of, and the mammoth carcass secured to the ship. 1854 J. S. C. Abbott Napoleon (1855) I. xv. 262 All the streets of the mammoth metropolis. 1874 Raymond Statist. Mines & Mining 505 The Mammoth vein itself is about 23 feet thick. 1896 Westm. Gaz. 20 June 7/1 Yorkshire made another mammoth score. 1924 W. R. Inge Lay Thoughts (1926) iii. ii. 192 The new journalism, with its ‘mammoth combines’, is good business, but bad democracy. 1956 Hansard Commons 10 May 1450/2 The coal industry today is having to undertake this mammoth reorganisation because of the failures of hon. Members opposite in the years between the wars. 1966 Auden About House 39 He offered Mammoth-marrow And, perhaps, Long Pig. 1974 Economist 21 Dec. 65/1 Britain's mammoth current account deficit. |
b. mammoth powder (see quot. 1875); mammoth-tree, the Sequoia (Wellingtonia) gigantea, a large coniferous tree, native of California.
| 1866 Treas. Bot. 1051/1 The Wellingtonia of our gardens, and the Big or Mammoth-tree of the Americans. 1875 Knight Dict. Mech. s.v. Gunpowder, For very heavy ordnance a much larger grained powder..called mammoth powder, was introduced by the late General T. J. Rodman. |