whale oil

1. 1.

   a white to brown oil obtained from whale blubber; formerly used as an illuminant

   Synonymstrain oil

   Broaderanimal oil

Questions about whale oil

What does whale oil mean?

whale oil means "a white to brown oil obtained from whale blubber; formerly used as an illuminant".

What is another word for whale oil?

Close synonyms include train oil. 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 whale oil a common word?

whale oil 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.