Bengal tiger
4
3.1
- noun
- /ˈbɛŋɡəl ˈtaɪɡər/
- Indian
:
tigre de bengala
- On my way to Hyderabad, I was reading a wonderful novel, The Life of Pi, about an Indian teenager who, after a shipwreck, ends up on a boat with an injured zebra, an orangutan, a very nervous hyena, and a Bengal tiger.
- Royal Bengal tiger
- rare Bengal tigers
- white Bengal tigers
Examples
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Yann Martel's fantasy adventure novel Life of Pi was long considered unfilmable, largely because it centers on the relationship between a boy and a Bengal tiger trapped together on a lifeboat.
Blog text (1) -
I can see how the core idea of this story—shipwrecked Indian boy awkwardly shares a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger—could make for fascinating reading.
Blog text (1) -
And what about the Bengal tiger who was kidnapped just last week in Singapore?
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Royal Bengal tiger now extinct in the wild.
Fiction book (1990) -
The mighty Bengal tiger is one of the most fearsome predators to walk the face of the Earth.
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While cast away, he forms an unexpected connection with another survivor... a fearsome Bengal tiger.
Blog text (9) -
In the mangrove swamp where I did most of my research, this track showed me where a 400-pound Royal Bengal tiger had slipped out of the forest and into the river to swim after my boat.
Fiction book (1998) -
The Bengal tiger is known for its striking orange fur and bold black stripes.
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In the wild, the population of Bengal tigers is critically low, with only a few thousand remaining.
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Visitors to India often go on safaris to spot the majestic Bengal tiger in its natural habitat.
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning ('a tiger from Bengal') is directly composed from 'Bengal' (a place/region) modifying 'tiger' (the animal), so the referent and sense are predictable from the parts. This origin/modifier + noun pattern is cross-linguistically common and would be clear to an average B1 learner who knows both constituents.
Etymology
Bengal tiger is named for the region of Bengal and the animal tiger. People used the place name to show this very large tiger is 'from Bengal', so the name helps us know which kind of tiger it is.