Flea meaning

flē
A small, wingless, parasitic insect of the order Siphonaptera, renowned for its bloodsucking habits and jumping abilities.
noun
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A thing of no significance.
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Obsolete spelling of flay.
verb
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Any of various small crustaceans that resemble or move like fleas, such as the water flea.
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Any of an order (Siphonaptera) of small, flattened, wingless insects with large legs adapted for jumping: as adults they are bloodsucking parasites on mammals and birds.
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noun
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Any of various small, wingless, bloodsucking insects of the order Siphonaptera that are parasitic on mammals and birds and can jump long distances.
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Any of various small, wingless, bloodsucking insects of the order Siphonaptera that are parasitic on mammals and birds and can jump long distances.
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a flea in (one's) ear
  • An annoying hint or a stinging rebuke.
idiom
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flea in one's ear
  • A stinging rebuke or rebuff, or an annoying hint.
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Idioms and Phrasal Verbs

a flea in (one's) ear

Origin of flea

  • Middle English fle from Old English flēah
    From American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition
  • From Middle English fle, from Old English flēah, flēa, from Proto-Germanic *flauhaz (cf. West Frisian flie, Dutch vlo, German Floh), from pre-Germanic *plóukos, from Proto-Indo-European *plúsis.
    From Wiktionary
  • Alternative forms.
    From Wiktionary

Flea Sentence Examples

  • (2) A flea can retain the plague bacilli alive for seven or eight days.

  • FLEA (0.

  • He even noted the fact that the pupa of the flea is sometimes attacked and fed upon by a mite - an observation which suggested the well.

  • The gad-fly (abu), the housefly (hai), the mosquito (ka), the flea (nonzi) and occasionally the bedbug (called by the Japanese kara-mushi because it is believed to be imported from China), are all fully represented, and the dragon-fly (tombO) presents itself in immense numbers at certain seasons.

  • Healthy rats contracted plague from infected rats when the only apparent means of communication between the two was the rat flea (pulex cheopis).

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Also Mentioned In

Words near flea in the Dictionary