sheep
n. countablen. a farm animal with a thick coat of wool. People keep them for their wool, meat, and milk.
n. a ruminant mammal of the genus Ovis, typically kept as livestock for its fleece, meat, or milk. Often used metaphorically to describe people who follow others without thinking for themselves.
The farmer shears the sheep every spring.
A large flock of sheep blocked the narrow road, forcing the driver to wait until the shepherd moved them.
While individual sheep are often perceived as docile and unintelligent, their flocking behaviour is a sophisticated survival mechanism designed to protect the group from predators in open landscapes.
Inherited from Middle English schep, schepe, from Anglian Old English sċēp (West Saxon sċēap), from Proto-West Germanic skāp, from Proto-Germanic skēpą, of unknown origin. Perhaps from the same Scythian word (compare Ossetian цӕу (cæw, “goat”), Persian چپش (čapiš, “yearling goat”)) which was borrowed into Albanian as cjap, sqap (“buck”) and into Slavic (compare Polish cap). After Kroonen, skēpą is instead from the root of Proto-Germanic skabaną (“to scratch”) via Kluge's law. Cognates Cognate with Scots sheep (“sheep”), Yola sheep, zheep (“sheep”), North Frisian schep, schäip, Sjip (“sheep”), Saterland Frisian Schäip, Skäip (“sheep”), West Frisian skiep (“sheep”), Alemannic German Schaf, Schooff (“sheep”), Bavarian Schof, Schouf, Schåf (“sheep”), Dutch schaap (“sheep”), German Schaf (“sheep”), German Low German Schaap (“sheep”), Limburgish Schoëp, sjaop (“sheep”), Luxembourgish Schof (“sheep”), Vilamovian siöf (“sheep”), Yiddish שאָף (shof, “sheep”).
The plural form is identical to the singular ('one sheep', 'two sheep').
The sheeps are in the fieldThe sheep are in the fieldSheep is an irregular noun that does not take an 's' in the plural form.
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black sheep
A nonconformist; an unusual or unconventional person, who may be rejected or disdained by others for this reason.
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count sheep
To attempt to go to sleep by thinking of something boring, traditionally by counting imaginary sheep.
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white sheep
a conformist; an ordinary or conventional person