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Dictionary

Words, grammatical forms and meanings linked to the ontology.

brass monkeys en · ADJ

Pronunciation

Etymology

From the phrase cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey - supposedly a reference to the brass container for cannon balls on a British man-of-war (but this seems to have been discredited).

Meanings

  1. (Commonwealth, Ireland, UK, idiomatic, informal, not-comparable) Very cold.
    • Blimey, it's brass monkeys out there today.

brass monkeys en · NOUN

Pronunciation

Etymology

From the phrase cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey - supposedly a reference to the brass container for cannon balls on a British man-of-war (but this seems to have been discredited).

Meanings

  1. (form-of, plural) plural of brass monkey
    form of brass monkey