Word.ws English Dictionary

dead men

dead men noun: used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see dead, men.

Noun

dead men pl (normally plural, singular dead man)

  1. (plural, plural-normally) Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see dead, men.
  2. (plural, plural-normally) The ends of reefs left flapping instead of being tucked out of sight when a sail has been furled.
  3. (US, informal, plural, plural-normally) The gills of edible crabs.
    • Remove eyes, dead men (gills), and sand sack if necessary.1992 April 26, Nathalie Dupree, “A craving for crabs”, in The Record, Bergen County, NJ, page F1
    • “I call these the lungs,” says Colleton, pointing to the gills with the dripping, short-handled knife. “The old people call them ‘dead men.’”2003 September 26, Michael Gartland, “Drought Forces Awendaw, S.C., Crab Festival to Import from Louisiana”, in Knight Ridder Tribune Business News, page 1

Synonyms of dead men

Forms of dead men

singulardead man

Questions about dead men

What does dead men mean?
Dead men means used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see dead, men.
What part of speech is dead men?
Dead men is a noun.

Words near dead men in the dictionary

  1. dead media
  2. dead melt
  3. dead melted
  4. dead melting
  5. dead melts
  6. dead men
  7. dead men can tell no tales
  8. dead men tell no tales
  9. dead men walking
  10. dead men's bells
  11. dead men's fingers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: dead men (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.

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