mosquito

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   A small flying insect whose females bite people and animals to suck blood, leaving an itchy bump and sometimes spreading diseases.

   A mosquito bit my arm and left an itchy red bump.

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Simplified etymology

Mosquito comes from Spanish mosquito “little gnat” or “mosquito,” a diminutive based on Spanish mosca “fly.” Mosca in turn developed from classical Latin musca, which could refer to any kind of fly.

Borrowed from Spanish mosquito (“gnat”), diminutive of mosca (“fly”), from Latin musca (“fly”), from Proto-Indo-European *mūs- (“fly, stinging fly, gnat”). Cognate with West Flemish meuzie (“mosquito”), dialectal Swedish mausa (“fly”), Lithuanian musė (“a fly”) and Sicilian muschitta (“midge”). See also midge. First attested in the 1580s.

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External links

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• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary