whamen.
Obsolete or dialect.
A gadfly.
ΘΚΠ
the world > animals > invertebrates > phylum Arthropoda > class Insecta > order Diptera or flies > [noun] > suborder Brachycera > family Tabanidae > member of genus Tabanus (gadfly or horse-fly)
breezea800
stoutc1000
horsefly1382
gad-bee1510
gadfly1569
brimse1579
wag-leg1585
breeze-fly1587
breame1589
beast-fly1658
burrel-fly1658
whame1658
gad-breeze1665
bree1678
garabee1692
gad1830
thunderbug1837
ox-warble1840
March fly1852
1658 J. Rowland tr. T. Moffett Theater of Insects in Topsell's Hist. Four-footed Beasts (rev. ed.) 937 This Fly [Curvicauda] the English in their proper tongue call a Whame and a Burrell-fly.
1775 B. Romans Conc. Nat. Hist. E. & W. Florida App. 51 (note) Tabona [sic] is Spanish for a whame or horsefly.
1829 S. Glover Hist. County of Derby I. 177 Oestrus Bovis, Whame or Burrel Fly.
1881 R. D. Blackmore Christowell (1882) ii He mistook a large stone~fly..for a genuine oestrus, a bot-fly, whame, or tabanus.
This entry has not yet been fully updated (first published 1923; most recently modified version published online December 2019).
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n.1658