Hello, you have come here looking for the meaning of the word fossil. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word fossil, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say fossil in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word fossil you have here. The definition of the word fossil will help you to be more precise and correct when speaking or writing your texts. Knowing the definition offossil, as well as those of other words, enriches your vocabulary and provides you with more and better linguistic resources.
1870, T. H. Huxley, “On Hypsilophodon Foxii, a new Dinosaurian from the Wealden of the Isle of Wight”, in Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, volume 26, page 9:
With the permission of the Keeper of the fossil collection, therefore, the specimen was subjected to a further careful removal of the matrix in the requisite directions.
1987, Cora Oostendorp, The Bryophytes of the Palaeozoic and the Mesozoic (Bryophytorum Bibliotheca; 34), Berlin, Stuttgart: J. Cramer, page 9:
Within the Hepaticae two types of fossils can be distinguished: those with sufficient characters to assign them to an order and those with more obscure characters.
2012 March-April, John T. Jost, “Social Justice: Is It in Our Nature (and Our Future)?”, in American Scientist, volume 100, number 2, archived from the original on 13 February 2012, page 162:
He draws eclectically on studies of baboons, descriptive anthropological accounts of hunter-gatherer societies and, in a few cases, the fossil record.
I do not want to convey any disrespectful notion or slight when I call those good and learned men fossils, but my experience is that people are apt to fossilise even at a University if they follow the same paths too persistently.
1897, Richard Marsh, The Beetle:
All at once there was a tapping at the window pane. Atherton was staring at us from without. He shouted through the glass, ‘Come out of that, you fossils! — I’ve news for you!’
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
1 When an adjective is applied predicatively to something definite, the corresponding "indefinite" form is used. 2 The "indefinite" superlatives may not be used attributively.
1 The indefinite superlative forms are only used in the predicative. 2 Dated or archaic. 3 Only used, optionally, to refer to things whose natural gender is masculine.