cygnet
3
8.1
A young swan not yet fully grown
- noun
- /ˈsɪɡnɪt/
:
cignete
- After hatching, the tiny cygnets quickly learn to swim with their mother on the calm lake.
- swan with cygnets
Examples
-
But ours let me swim with them once the cygnets were out of the nest.
Fiction book (1991) -
A swan with five cygnets in her train walked past them across the grass and disappeared behind a boxwood hedge.
Fiction book (2001) -
He sat on a stone bench beside the lake and watched two stately swans swim by, followed by two amusing cygnets.
Fiction book (1993) -
I saw a mother swan swimming gracefully with her adorable cygnet following closely behind.
-
The park is home to several ponds where visitors can often see cygnets paddling alongside their parents.
How Young
Surface Forms
Etymology
The word cygnet comes from the old word cygnus meaning 'swan' plus the small-ending -et, so it literally meant 'little swan'. Think of the same small-ending in words like 'piglet', which helps remember that a cygnet is a young, small swan.