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Definition of "unguiculate" [un•guic•u•late]

  • Having or resembling nails or claws. (adjective)
  • Zoology Having nails or claws, as opposed to hooves. Used of mammals. (adjective)
  • Botany Having a claw-shaped base: an unguiculate petal. (adjective)
  • Zoology A mammal having nails or claws. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Use "unguiculate" in a sentence
  • "For example, the human germ, primarily similar to all others, first differentiates from vegetal germs, then from invertebrate germs, and subsequently assumes the mammalian, placental unguiculate, and lastly the human characters."
  • "Corolla of 4 unguiculate petals, between white and straw color, 1 'long."
  • "Because the latter being divided into three branches by the diversity of the habits which, with the lapse of time, they have adopted, some have caused the formation of the Cetacea, others that of the ungulated mammals, and still others that of the unguiculate mammals."