wolf

/wʊlf/

/wʊlf/

Other forms: wolves; wolfing; wolfs; wolfed

A wolf is a larger, wilder relative of your pet dog. Like your cocker spaniel, a wolf is a canine. Unlike your cocker spaniel, a wolf isn't nice to cuddle with during a thunderstorm.

You can find wolves in parts of Europe, Asia, and North America, although there are significantly fewer of them today than there once were. Conservation measures have steadied the wolf population in remote and rural areas since the 1970s, however, so they're no longer considered endangered. Wolves rarely attack humans, unless they're sick with rabies. As a verb, to wolf means to eat very fast — in other words, to eat as voraciously as a wolf.

Definitions of wolf

1. noun

   any of various predatory carnivorous canine mammals of North America and Eurasia that usually hunt in packs
   types:

   wolf cub, wolf pup

   a young wolf

   Canis lupus, gray wolf, grey wolf, timber wolf

   a wolf with a brindled grey coat living in forested northern regions of North America

   Arctic wolf, Canis lupus tundrarum, white wolf

   wolf of Arctic North America having white fur and a black-tipped tail

   Canis niger, Canis rufus, maned wolf, red wolf

   reddish-grey wolf of southwestern North America

   Canis latrans, brush wolf, coyote, prairie wolf

   small wolf native to western North America

   coydog

   offspring of a coyote and a dog

   type of:

   canid, canine

   any of various fissiped mammals with nonretractile claws and typically long muzzles
2. noun

   a cruelly rapacious person
   synonyms: beast, brute, savage, wildcat

   type of:

   aggressor, assailant, assaulter, attacker

   someone who attacks
3. noun

   a man who is aggressive in making amorous advances to women
   synonyms: masher, skirt chaser, woman chaser

   type of:

   philanderer, womaniser, womanizer

   a man who likes many women and has short sexual relationships with them
4. verb

   eat hastily
   “The teenager wolfed down the pizza”

   synonyms: wolf down

   type of:

   eat

   take in solid food