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English
Etymology
From Middle English gnat, from Old English gnætt (“gnat; midge; mosquito”), from Proto-West Germanic *gnatt, *gnattu, from Proto-Germanic *gnattaz, *gnattuz (“gnat”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰneHdʰn-, *gʰneHd- (“to gnaw; scratch”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰen- (“to gnaw; bite; scratch; grind”). Cognate with Low German Gnatte (“gnat”), dialectal Swedish gnatt (“mosquito”), German Gnatz (“scabs; rash; scabies; stinginess”). Related also gnit and gnaw.
Pronunciation
Noun
gnat (plural gnats)
- Any small insect of the order Diptera, specifically within the suborder Nematocera.
- (informal) An annoying person.
1971, Richard Carpenter, Catweazle and the Magic Zodiac, Harmondsworth: Puffin Books, page 115:"Away thou whining gnat, and trouble me not!"
Derived terms
Translations
any small insect of the order Diptera
- Afrikaans: mug
- Arabic:
- Egyptian Arabic: برغش m (barḡaš)
- Armenian: մոծակ (hy) (mocak)
- Bashkir: серәкәй (serəkəy)
- Bengali: ডাঁশ (bn) (ḍãś)
- Bikol Central: nuknok (bcl)
- Bulgarian: комар (bg) m (komar)
- Catalan: mosquit (ca) m
- Chinese:
- Mandarin: 蚋 (zh) (ruì), (mosquito) 蚊 (zh) (wén)
- Danish: myg (da) c, stikmyg c
- Dupaningan Agta: rahik
- Dutch: mug (nl) f, knut (nl)
- Erzya: марав (marav)
- Esperanto: kulo (eo)
- Estonian: please add this translation if you can
- Faroese: mýggjabiti m
- Finnish: sääski (fi)
- French: moucheron (fr) m
- German: Stechmücke (de) f, (colloquial, regional) Schnake (de) f
- Greek:
- Ancient: κώνωψ m (kṓnōps)
- Greenlandic: ippernaq
- Guaraní: ñati'û
- Gujarati: મચ્છર m (macchar)
- Hungarian: szúnyog (hu)
- Irish: corrmhíol m
- Italian: moscerino (it)
- Japanese: 蚋 (ja) (ぶよ, buyo), ブヨ (buyo)
- Kapampangan: absang
- Korean: 모기 (ko) (mogi)
- Latin: culex m, (rare) alucita f
- Latvian: ods (lv) m
- Lithuanian: mašalas m
- Macedonian: мушичка f (mušička), комарец m (komarec)
- Malagasy: aloiloy (mg)
- Malayalam: നുളമ്പ് (ml) (nuḷampŭ)
- Manx: meeyl f, quill f
- Norman: bibet m
- Norwegian: knott m
- Persian: پشه (fa) (paše)
- Polish: komar (pl) m
- Portuguese: mosquito (pt) m, mosquitinho m pl
- Russian: мо́шка (ru) f (móška), (mosquito) кома́р (ru) m (komár)
- Scottish Gaelic: meanbh-chuileag f
- Serbo-Croatian:
- Cyrillic: мушица f, (mosquito) комарац f
- Roman: mušica (sh) f, (mosquito) komarac (sh) f
- Sicilian: muschitta (scn) f, sampagghiuni m, siḍḍu m
- Spanish: mosquito (es) m, jején (es) m, maje (es) m, mime (es) m
- Swedish: stickmygga (sv) c
- Tagalog: niknik
- Turkish: sivrisinek (tr)
- Ukrainian: мошка f (moška), мушка f (muška), комар (uk) m (komar)
- Vietnamese: ruồi nhuế
- Volapük: (♂♀) muskitil, (♂) himuskitil, (♀) jimuskitil
- Welsh: gwybedyn m
- West Frisian: langskonk
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See also
Anagrams
Middle English
Etymology
From Old English gnætt, from Proto-Germanic *gnattaz.
Pronunciation
Noun
gnat (plural gnattes)
- A gnat or similar insect.
- Something of little worth or importance.
Descendants
References
Polish
Etymology
Inherited from Proto-Slavic *gnatъ.
Pronunciation
Noun
gnat m animal (diminutive gnacik)
- (colloquial) large bone
- (slang) gun
- (Far Masovian) animal bone
- Synonym: kość
- (Far Masovian) human bone
- Synonym: kość
- Gnaty me bolą. ― My bones hurt.
Declension
Further reading
- gnat in Wielki słownik języka polskiego, Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
- gnat in Polish dictionaries at PWN
- Wojciech Grzegorzewicz (1894) “gnat”, in “O języku ludowym w powiecie przasnyskim”, in Sprawozdania Komisji Językowej Akademii Umiejętności (in Polish), volume 5, Krakow: Akademia Umiejętności, page 108
- Leon Rzeszowski (1891) “gnat”, in “Spis wyrazów ludowych z okolic Żywca”, in Sprawozdania Komisyi Językowej Akademii Umiejętności, volume 4, Krakow: Drukarnia Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego, page 355