Word.ws English Dictionary

bluebottle

bluebottle noun: a cornflower, a plant that grows in grain fields, Centaurea cyanus.

bluebottle: a cornflower, a plant that grows in grain fields, Centaurea cyanus
Image: AYArktos, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun (1)

bluebottle (plural bluebottles)

  1. A cornflower, a plant that grows in grain fields, Centaurea cyanus.
  2. Any of various blowflies of the genus Calliphora that have an iridescent metallic-blue body and make a loud buzzing noise when flying.
    • The flies that troubled me most were a large kind of blue-bottle or blow-fly. These settled in swarms on my bird skins when first put out to dry, filling their plumage with masses of eggs, which, if neglected, the next day produced maggots.1869, Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipelago, volume II, London: Macmillan and Co., page 329
    • The incredibly long body as well as the extended wings were of a gleaming purplish-gray colour: I can only liken it to that of a meat fly or common "bluebottle".1930, Sax Rohmer, The Day the World Ended, published 1969, page i. 16
  3. A blue ant, Diamma bicolor, a parasitic wasp native to Australia.
  4. Any of various large papilionid butterflies of the genus Graphium, also called triangles, etc.
  5. (Australia, Ireland, UK, derogatory, slang) A police officer.
    • I will have you as soundly swing’d for this, you bluebottle rogue!c. 1596–1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Fourth, […]. Epilogue.”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […]...
    • […] comic writers […] have never failed to make capital out of the New Police, Peel's Raw-Lobsters, Peelers, Blue Bottles, &c., &c.1878, Charles Hindley, The life and times of James Catnach, page 206
  6. (derogatory, obsolete) A bluestocking.
    • To-morrow there is a party of purple at the “blue” Miss Berry’s. Shall I go? um! — I don’t much affect your blue-bottles ; — but one ought to be civil.1813, Lord G. G. Byron, edited by Rowland E. Prothero, The Works Of Lord Byron Letters And Journals Vol II, page 358
    • There appears to be a growing disposition on the part of the literary and dramatic blue-bottles of this city to get up a national drama and to manufacture a new race of actors.1846 February 22, “Letter from Spranger Barry, Esq.”, in Sunday Dispatch (New York), page 2, Column 6

Noun (2)

bluebottle (plural bluebottles)

  1. A marine jellyfish of the genus Physalia, which includes Physalia physalis, the Portuguese man-of-war, and Physalia utriculus, the Pacific man-of-war; a man-of-war.

bluebottle meaning in Tamil and Urdu

bluebottle in Tamil

நமது பூமியில் காணப்படும் பூச்சிகளில், இது முக்கியமானதொரு இனமாகும்

bluebottle in Urdu

بڑی مکھی, نیلی مکھی

Examples of bluebottle in a sentence

  • We don't want to have the bluebottles come sniffing round here, do we?1882, Henry Herman, Henry Arthur Jones, The Silver King:
  • ..and did not the rich dowager-countess Bluebottle marry her footman, who forthwith became a lord and was made a privy counsellor.1853 January 29, Geo. F. Pardon, “Common People”, in The Working Man’s Friend, page 282:

Forms of bluebottle

pluralbluebottles
alternative formblue-bottle

Origin of bluebottle

From Middle English blewbothel, from blew (“blue”) + bothel (“flower in the Asteraceae family”). In sense 2, a shortening of bluebottle fly. The fly was so named because it resembles the bluebottle flower in colour. The other transferred senses likewise have reference to the colour of the respective referents.

From blue + bottle, in reference to the creature's bottle-like bladder.

Words formed from bluebottle

  • blue-bottle fly

Questions about bluebottle

What does bluebottle mean?
Bluebottle means a cornflower, a plant that grows in grain fields, Centaurea cyanus.
What is bluebottle in Tamil?
Bluebottle in Tamil is நமது பூமியில் காணப்படும் பூச்சிகளில், இது முக்கியமானதொரு இனமாகும். See Bluebottle meaning in Tamil.
How do you use bluebottle in a sentence?
We don't want to have the bluebottles come sniffing round here, do we?
What part of speech is bluebottle?
Bluebottle is a noun.
What is the plural of bluebottle?
The plural of bluebottle is bluebottles.

Words near bluebottle in the dictionary

  1. bluebonnets
  2. bluebook
  3. bluebooked
  4. bluebooking
  5. bluebooks
  6. bluebottle
  7. bluebottles
  8. bluebreast
  9. bluebreast darter
  10. bluebreasts
  11. bluebs

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: bluebottle (page history and authors); bluebottle (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); bluebottle (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-bluebottle.ogg.

Cite this entry: “bluebottle.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/bluebottle. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.