Dictionary

conchology en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• (Southern-England) audio
• /kɒŋˈkɒləd͡ʒi/

Etymology

From conch or Ancient Greek κόγχη (kónkhē) + -ology.

Meanings

1. (uncountable, usually) The study of molluscs and their shells.
   • "Thank goodness, I am not a child," said Lady Mandeville, turning over a collection of those juvenile tomes, which are to make the rising generation so much wiser than their grandfathers or grandmothers—catechisms of conchology, geology, mathematical questions for infants, geography, astronomy; "the child may be 'father to the man;' but the said father must have had some trouble with his offspring." 1831, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter VI, in Romance and Reality. […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC, page 94:
   • The least dreadful among the essays stacked and waiting to be corrected would be that of young Master Jefferson Davis, who when imprisoned by Andrew Johnson in 1866 will ask his physician at Fortress Monroe to procure a few volumes of "conchology, geology, or botany," he desiring to commune with the interests of more innocent days. 2011, John Jeremiah Sullivan, Pulphead:
2. (uncountable, usually) The hobby of shell collecting.

Forms

Deriveds

conchological · conchologize · conchologist

Relateds

malacology

Translations (13)

ja 貝類学 (study of molluscs) · fi nilviäistutkimus (study of molluscs) · fr conchyliologie (study of molluscs) · de Conchologie (study of molluscs) · cmn 貝殼學 /贝壳学 (study of molluscs) · br kreginoniezh (study of molluscs) · pt conquiliologia (study of molluscs) · gl conquilioloxía (study of molluscs) · fi simpukankuorien keräily (shell collecting) · es conquiliología (study of molluscs) · tl dalubkabibihan (study of molluscs) · ko 패류학 (study of molluscs) · it concologia (study of molluscs)