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Glite Dictionary
🦋 A woodland butterfly 🦋 A garden butterfly
white admiral

white admiral

8.2
A brown butterfly with white bands on its wings that lives in woods
  • noun
  • UK
translation icon : admiral blanco
  • The white admiral is known for its distinctive white bands across its brown wings.

Examples

  • We spotted a white admiral gracefully gliding among the trees in the forest.

  • Many wildlife photographers hope to capture a close-up of a white admiral during the summer months.

  • Look at that stunning white admiral resting on the leaf!

  • I spotted a beautiful white admiral in the garden.

  • We spotted a white admiral gracefully gliding among the trees in the forest.

  • Many wildlife photographers hope to capture a close-up of a white admiral during the summer months.

  • The white admiral is known for its distinctive white bands across its brown wings.

Synonyms

Limenitis camilla
vswhite admiral
  • Specialized
9.9

A brown butterfly with white bands often seen in European woodlands

is the everyday common name used by ordinary people

Surface Forms

white admiral singular
white admirals plural

Morphology

white + admiral

Although 'white' transparently denotes color, 'admiral' here is a conventional name for a group of butterflies rather than the naval rank a B1 learner would know. Because the overall meaning ('a butterfly species') relies on a specialized, lexicalized sense of 'admiral' that is not inferable from the common meanings of the parts, the expression is not predictable from its constituents.

Etymology

White admiral may come from the butterfly's look: its dark brown wings have a bright white band that reminded people of an admiral's 'white sash' or stripe. So, the name now means a butterfly with a white band across dark wings.