Word Direct Answers

What does "mouth" mean?

Mouth: Hence: An opening affording entrance or exit; orifice; aperture; as: (a) The opening of a vessel by which it is filled or emptied, charged or discharged; as, the mouth of a jar or pitcher; the mouth of the lacteal vessels, etc. (b) The opening or entrance of any cavity, as a cave, pit, well, or den. (c) The opening of a piece of ordnance, through which it is discharged. (d) The opening through which the waters of a river or any stream are discharged. (e) The entrance into a harbor.

Additional senses

  1. 2.(Saddlery) The crosspiece of a bridle bit, which enters the mouth of an animal.
  2. 3.A principal speaker; one who utters the common opinion; a mouthpiece. Every coffeehouse has some particular statesman belonging to it, who is the mouth of the street where he lives. Addison.
  3. 4.Cry; voice. [Obs.] Dryden.
  4. 5.Speech; language; testimony. That in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established. Matt. xviii.
  5. 6.7. A wry face; a grimace; a mow. Counterfeit sad looks, Make mouths upon me when I turn my back. Shak. Down in the mouth, chapfallen; of dejected countenance; depressed; discouraged. [Obs. or Colloq.] -- Mouth friend, one who professes friendship insincerely. Shak. -- Mouth glass, a small mirror for inspecting the mouth or teeth. -- Mouth honor, honor given in words, but not felt. Shak. -- Mouth organ. (Mus.) (a) Pan's pipes. See Pandean. (b) An harmonicon. -- Mouth pipe, an organ pipe with a lip or plate to cut the escaping air and make a sound. -- To stop the mouth, to silence or be silent; to put to shame; to confound. The mouth of them that speak lies shall be stopped. Ps. lxiii.
  6. 7.Whose mouths must be stopped. Titus i.
  7. 8.1. To take into the mouth; to seize or grind with the mouth or teeth; to chew; to devour. Dryden.
  8. 9.To utter with a voice affectedly big or swelling; to speak in a strained or unnaturally sonorous manner. "Mouthing big phrases." Hare. Mouthing out his hollow oes and aes. Tennyson.
  9. 10.To form or cleanse with the mouth; to lick, as a bear her cub. Sir T. Browne.
  10. 11.To make mouths at. [R.] R. Blair.
  11. 12.To speak with a full, round, or loud, affected voice; to vociferate; to rant. I'll bellow out for Rome, and for my country, And mouth at Cæsar, till I shake the senate. Addison.
  12. 13.To put mouth to mouth; to kiss. [R.] Shak.
  13. 14.To make grimaces, esp. in ridicule or contempt. Well I know, when I am gone, How she mouths behind my back. Tennyson.

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