CLAM • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Clam

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noun

Clam n.

1.

(Zool.) A bivalve mollusk of many kinds, especially those that are edible; as, the long clam (Mya arenaria), the quahog or round clam (Venus mercenaria), the sea clam or hen clam (Spisula solidissima), and other species of the United States. The name is said to have been given originally to the Tridacna gigas, a huge East Indian bivalve. "You shall scarce find any bay or shallow shore, or cove of sand, where you may not take many clampes, or lobsters, or both, at your pleasure." "Clams, or clamps, is a shellfish not much unlike a cockle; it lieth under the sand."

2.

(Ship Carp.) Strong pinchers or forceps.

3.

pl. (Mech.) A kind of vise, usually of wood.

Blood clam. See under Blood.

Clam n. Claminess; moisture. (R.) "The clam of death."

Clam n. A crash or clangor made by ringing all the bells of a chime at once.

verb

Clam v. t. & v. i. To produce, in bell ringing, a clam or clangor; to cause to clang.

Clam v. t. (past & past part. clammed; pres. part. clamming) To clog, as with glutinous or viscous matter. "A swarm of wasps got into a honey pot, and there they cloyed and clammed Themselves till there was no getting out again."

Clam v. i. To be moist or glutinous; to stick; to adhere. (R.)

See images of 'Clam'

Etymology of 'Clam'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Clam" Quotes from Famous Books

... emergency use. She could forage for herself at present. Diving down the main passage she presently issued from the water-gate, and immediately rose to the clear-roofed air-space. Here she nibbled tentatively at some stems and withered leafage. These proving little to her taste, she suddenly remembered a clam-bed not far off, and instantly set out for it. She swam briskly down-stream along the air-space, her eyes and nose just out of the water, the ice gleaming silvery ...

— The Watchers of the Trails - A Book of Animal Life • Charles G. D. Roberts

... for the sake of educating her illiterate mid-Western stomach. She ordered clam chowder and Hamburger steak, spaghetti Italienne, lobster salad, and Neapolitan ice-cream. She ate ...

— We Can't Have Everything • Rupert Hughes

... structural possibilities of that division of the Animal Kingdom,—without recalling to my readers a Polyp or a Jelly-Fish, a Sea-Urchin or a Star-Fish. Neither can I present the structural elements of the Mollusk plan, without reminding them of an Oyster or a Clam, a Snail or a Cuttle-Fish,—or of the Articulate plan, without calling up at once the form of a Worm, a Lobster, or an Insect,—or of the Vertebrate plan, without giving it the special character of ...

— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... one may be waiting in the hall and watching with a keen glance for the approach of the physician who is to announce that one is a forefather. The amateur forefather of 1620 must have felt proud yet anxious about the clam-yield also, as each new mouth opened ...

— Comic History of the United States • Bill Nye

... colored-man principles," said Corporal London Simmons, indignantly defending himself from some charge before me. "I'se got white-gemman principles. I'se do my best. If Cap'n tell me to take a man, s'pose de man be as big as a house, I'll clam hold on him till I die, ...

— Army Life in a Black Regiment • Thomas Wentworth Higginson

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