civet cat

Questions about civet cat

What is another word for civet cat?

It depends which civet cat you mean. In the sense “raccoon-like omnivorous mammal of Mexico and the southwestern United States having a long bushy tail with black and white rings”, the synonyms are bassarisk, cacomistle, cacomixle, coon cat, raccoon fox, ringtail, ring-tailed cat, miner's cat, Bassariscus astutus. Across all 2 senses there are 10 distinct synonyms, and they are not interchangeable with each other — this page lists them under the sense each one belongs to.

What is the opposite of civet cat?

WordNet records no antonym for civet cat. Antonymy in WordNet is a relation between specific word forms rather than between concepts, so it is recorded only where lexicographers judged the pairing direct. An absence here means none was recorded, not that none can be imagined.

Why are the synonyms for civet cat split into groups?

Because civet cat carries 2 recorded senses and each has its own set of substitutes. A single flat list would put words from unrelated meanings side by side with nothing to tell them apart, which is exactly how a writer picks the wrong one. The grouping comes from WordNet's synsets, not from an editorial judgement of ours.

Where do the synonyms for civet cat come from?

From Princeton University's WordNet, a lexical database maintained by lexicographers since 1985. A synonym here means a word form that shares a synset with this word — a set of forms interchangeable in one recorded context. Nothing on this page is generated by a language model.

Other views of civet cat

• Full entry for civet catAll 2 senses, with examples, usage labels, syllables and pronunciation.
• Rhymes for civet catWhether this word can be rhymed at all — it is not in the pronouncing dictionary.
• Thesaurus homeHow WordNet synsets work, and the collections built for synonym work.