common murre

noun

variants or chiefly British common guillemot

: a black-and-white seabird (Uria aalge) of northern seas having a thin, long, straight bill

The common murre is a black-and-white seabird that, when it stands erect on shore, resembles a penguin. The female lays her single egg on the ledge of a cliff; the egg is pear shaped so that if it rolls, it rolls in a circle instead of off the edge of the cliff.

—Robert H. Mohlenbrock, Natural History, January 1991

Word History

First Known Use

1784, in the meaning defined above

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