kelpie
noun /ˈkelpi/
/ˈkelpi/
- (in Scottish stories) a water spirit, especially one that takes the form of a horse
- an Australian sheepdog
Word Originlate 17th cent.: perhaps from Scottish Gaelic cailpeach, colpach ‘bullock, colt’. Sense (2) apparently comes from the name of a particular bitch, King's Kelpie (c.1879).