mice

[mahys] /maɪs/

noun

plural of mouse.

Can be confused

mice, mouses.

mouse

[n. mous; v. mouz] /n. maʊs; v. maʊz/

noun, plural mice

[mahys] /maɪs/ (Show IPA)

any of numerous small Old World rodents of the family Muridae, especially of the genus Mus, introduced widely in other parts of the world.

any similar small animal of various rodent and marsupial families.

a quiet, timid person.

Computers. a palm-sized, button-operated pointing device that can be used to move, select, activate, and change items on a computer screen.

Compare joystick (def 2), stylus (def 3).

Informal. a swelling under the eye, caused by a blow or blows; black eye.

Slang. a girl or woman.

verb (used with object), moused, mousing.

to hunt out, as a cat hunts out mice.

Nautical. to secure with a mousing.

verb (used without object), moused, mousing.

to hunt for or catch mice.

10.

to prowl about, as if in search of something:

The burglar moused about for valuables.

11.

to seek or search stealthily or watchfully, as if for prey.

12.

Computers. to use a mouse to move the cursor on a computer screen to any position.

Origin

before 900; Middle English mous (plural mis), Old English mūs (plural mȳs); cognate with German Maus, Old Norse mūs, Latin mūs, Greek mŷs

Related forms

mouselike, adjective

Can be confused

mice, mouses.

mouse, mousse.

Examples from the web for mice

She gave him a yellow turnip which had been hollowed out, to which six mice were harnessed.
The watch-dog does not get sweet milk unless there be drowned mice in it.
Better small-animal models, in rats and mice, have been developed.
mice that are color-matched to their surroundings have a survival advantage over mismatched mice in each of the two habitats.
More clues are coming from lab mice that have a genetic mutation that allows them to partially regrow severed digits.
At five weeks old they're full-fledged killers, dispatching mice on their own.
He might drop by an antiques store to buy eerie dolls or emerge from a hobby shop with a jar of snakes or mice cured in formalin.
Little research has been devoted to studying sunburn on animals other than humans and lab mice.
Many nocturnal animals, such as mice and voles, remained in their underground retreats during the morning explosion.
The resulting deeply purple fruit promoted longer lives when fed to laboratory mice.

British Dictionary definitions for mice

mice

/maɪs/

noun

the plural of mouse

mouse

noun (maʊs) (pl) mice (maɪs)

any of numerous small long-tailed rodents of the families Muridae and Cricetidae that are similar to but smaller than rats See also fieldmouse, harvest mouse, house mouse related adjective murine

any of various related rodents, such as the jumping mouse

a quiet, timid, or cowardly person

(computing) a hand-held device used to control the cursor movement and select computing functions without keying

(slang) a black eye

(nautical) another word for mousing

verb (maʊz)

to stalk and catch (mice)

(intransitive) to go about stealthily

(transitive) (nautical) to secure (a hook) with mousing

Derived Forms

mouselike, adjective

Word Origin

Old English mūs; compare Old Saxon mūs, German Maus, Old Norse mūs, Latin mūs, Greek mūs

Word Origin and History for mice

mouse

Old English mus "small rodent," also "muscle of the arm," from Proto-Germanic *mus (cf. Old Norse, Old Frisian, Middle Dutch, Danish, Swedish mus, Dutch muis, German Maus "mouse"), from PIE *mus- (cf. Sanskrit mus "mouse, rat," Old Persian mush "mouse," Old Church Slavonic mysu, Latin mus, Lithuanian muse "mouse," Greek mys "mouse, muscle").

Plural form mice (Old English mys) shows effects of i-mutation. Contrasted with man (n.) from 1620s. Meaning "black eye" (or other discolored lump) is from 1842. Computer sense is from 1965, though applied to other things resembling a mouse in shape since 1750, mainly nautical.

Parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus [Horace]

"to hunt mice," mid-13c., from mouse (n.). Related: Moused; mousing.

mice in Science

mouse

(mous)
Plural mice (mīs) or mouses
A hand-held input device that is moved about on a flat surface to direct the cursor on a computer screen. It also has buttons for activating computer functions. The underside of a mechanical mouse contains a rubber-coated ball that rotates as the mouse is moved; optical sensors detect the motion and move the screen pointer correspondingly. An optical mouse is cordless and uses reflections from an LED to track the mouse's movement over a special reflective mat which is marked with a grid that acts as a frame of reference.

mice in Culture

mouse definition

A common device that allows the user to reposition an arrow on their computer screen in order to activate desired applications. The term mouse comes from the appearance of the device, with the cord to the main computer being seen as a tail of sorts.

Note: The user usually sends signals to the computer when the user depresses or “clicks” a switch. A number of slang terms, such as “click on X” or “click and drag” have arisen from the appearance of symbols on a screen when a mouse is used.

Slang definitions & phrases for mice

mice

noun

Children

[1950s+ Television studio; fr the popular children's program The Mickey Mouse Club]

mouse

noun

A bruise near the eye, caused by a blow; black eye, shiner: One of the Kid's eyes has a little mouse under it (1842+)
A young woman: a little mouse I got to know up in Michigan/ I'm pouring Dom Pe´rignon and black eggs into this little mouse (1655+)
A term of endearment for a woman: Just stepping out for a minute, mouse (1520+)

mice in Technology

Multimedia Integrated Conferencing for European Researchers

mouse

mice in the Bible

Heb. 'akhbar, "swift digger"), properly the dormouse, the field-mouse (1 Sam. 6:4). In Lev. 11:29, Isa. 66:17 this word is used generically, and includes the jerboa (Mus jaculus), rat, hamster (Cricetus), which, though declared to be unclean animals, were eaten by the Arabs, and are still eaten by the Bedouins. It is said that no fewer than twenty-three species of this group ('akhbar=Arab. ferah) of animals inhabit Palestine. God "laid waste" the people of Ashdod by the terrible visitation of field-mice, which are like locusts in their destructive effects (1 Sam. 6:4, 11, 18). Herodotus, the Greek historian, accounts for the destruction of the army of Sennacherib (2 Kings 19:35) by saying that in the night thousands of mice invaded the camp and gnawed through the bow-strings, quivers, and shields, and thus left the Assyrians helpless. (See SENNACHERIB.)

Idioms and Phrases with mice

mice

see:

also see under:

mouse

see:

also see under:

mice