zebra swallowtailnoun
Factsheet
What does the noun zebra swallowtail mean?
There is one meaning in OED's entry for the noun zebra swallowtail. See ‘Meaning & use’ for definition, usage, and quotation evidence.
How common is the noun zebra swallowtail?
| 1900 | 0.0016 |
| 1910 | 0.0013 |
| 1920 | 0.0013 |
| 1930 | 0.0012 |
| 1940 | 0.0011 |
| 1950 | 0.0012 |
| 1960 | 0.0013 |
| 1970 | 0.0009 |
| 1980 | 0.0012 |
| 1990 | 0.0011 |
| 2000 | 0.0012 |
| 2010 | 0.0014 |
Where does the noun zebra swallowtail come from?
Earliest known use
1850s
The earliest known use of the noun zebra swallowtail is in the 1850s.
OED's earliest evidence for zebra swallowtail is from 1855, in Home Friend.
Nearby entries
- zebra plant, n.1826–
- zebra poison, n.1871–74
- zebra print, n. & adj.1932–
- zebra rhomb, n.1770–1844
- zebra rock, n.1895–
- zebra rush, n.1882–
- zebra shark, n.1804–
- zebra skin, n.1774–
- zebra spider, n.1806–
- zebra suit, n.1853–
- zebra swallowtail, n.1855–
- zebra wolf, n.1808–
- zebrawood, n.1768–
- zebra woodpecker, n.1884–
- zebrina, n.1846–
- zebrine, adj.a1810–
- zebroid, adj. & n.1881–
- zebrule, n.1899–
- zebu, n.1771–
- zecchino, n.1572–
- Zechstein, n.1798–
Meaning & use
- 1855–A large swallowtail butterfly having white wings with black longitudinal stripes, Protographium marcellus, native to eastern North America.
- 1855
Here is a very handsome kind, the Zebra Swallow-tail (Papilio Ajax).
Home Friend vol. 2 220 - 1901
The Tiger Swallowtail..the Zebra Swallowtail, the Cabbage butterfly..and the Clouded Sulphur..form a well-marked family.
M. C. Dickerson, Moths & Butterflies iii. 248 - 2014
An adult zebra swallowtail alights on a sugar maple seedling.
R. Darke & D. Tallamy, Living Landscape i. 28 (caption)
the world animals invertebrates phylum Arthropoda class Insecta Rhopalocera (butterflies) [nouns] family Papilionidae member of (swallow-tail)- Having each of the hind wings prolonged into a ‘tail’, the two together suggesting the forked tail of a swallow, as the swallow-tailed butterfly n.…
- attributive. = swallow-tailed, adj.: as in swallowtail butterfly, swallowtail coat, swallowtail moth, swallowtail pennon; also formerly applied…
- zebra swallowtail1855–A large swallowtail butterfly having white wings with black longitudinal stripes, Protographium marcellus, native to eastern North America.
- swallowtail1869–Applied to various animals having a forked tail. A swallow-tailed butterfly.
Frequency
zebra swallowtail typically occurs fewer than 0.01 times per million words in modern written English.
zebra swallowtail is in frequency band 2, which contains words occurring between 0.001 and 0.01 times per million words in modern written English. More about OED's frequency bands
Frequency of zebra swallowtail, n., 1900–2010
* Occurrences per million words in written English
Historical frequency series are derived from Google Books Ngrams (version 2), a data set based on the Google Books corpus of several million books printed in English between 1500 and 2010.
The overall frequency for a given word is calculated by summing frequencies for the main form of the word, any plural or inflected forms, and any major spelling variations.
For sets of homographs (distinct entries that share the same word-form, e.g. mole, n.¹, mole, n.², mole, n.³, etc.), we have estimated the frequency of each homograph entry as a fraction of the total Ngrams frequency for the word-form. This may result in inaccuracies.
Smoothing has been applied to series for lower-frequency words, using a moving-average algorithm. This reduces short-term fluctuations, which may be produced by variability in the content of the Google Books corpus.
| Decade | Frequency per million words |
|---|---|
| 1900 | 0.0016 |
| 1910 | 0.0013 |
| 1920 | 0.0013 |
| 1930 | 0.0012 |
| 1940 | 0.0011 |
| 1950 | 0.0012 |
| 1960 | 0.0013 |
| 1970 | 0.0009 |
| 1980 | 0.0012 |
| 1990 | 0.0011 |
| 2000 | 0.0012 |
| 2010 | 0.0014 |