black rat

1. 1.

   common household pest originally from Asia that has spread worldwide

   Synonymsroof ratRattus rattus

   Broaderrat

   Part ofRattus

Questions about black rat

What does black rat mean?

black rat means "common household pest originally from Asia that has spread worldwide".

What is another word for black rat?

Close synonyms include roof rat, Rattus rattus. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is black rat a common word?

black rat is banded "Uncommon" — turns up in careful writing rather than conversation. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.