Word.ws English Dictionary

dogship

dogship noun: the character or individuality of a dog.

Noun (1)

dogship (countable and uncountable, plural dogships)

  1. The character or individuality of a dog.
    • True, Shalto was a remarkable dog, and his master was fully aware of his many excellencies, for after a companionhip of twelve years, Shalto died, leaving so deep an impression behind him that he was celebrated in verse, and his friend would never hazard a second dog. Now this is what I call the...1845, Mrs. E. Oakes Smith, “Doghood”, in The Juvenile Gem For 1846, page 151
    • The philosophy of it is this: a snap or two at your hat will suffice to let the steam off—the wrathful passion escapes, and having displayed the courage of his dogship, he is satisfied .1861, William Taylor, The Model Preacher, page 219
  2. A dog, especially when referred to formally.
    • As to that other tolerably large section of irreligionists, who are ever disposed to pick a quarrel with their opponents, but never disposed to fight with them—they are well rebuked by the fabulist, who tells us that once, no matter when, a pugnacious duck was revelling in a pond, whereupon a dog...1843, “Third Bulletin From the Seat of War: Arrest of Paterson”, in The Investigator, volume 21, page 165
    • When the man turned the lantern so that its light shown on his dogship, he perceived that the animal did not move, but kept his large eyes coolly and steadily fixed on him."1866 April, Emma C. Barber, “Agnes Dubois”, in The Ladies' Repository, volume 35, number 4, page 215
  3. A term of opprobrium.
    • Not mine hand, Surely; but say my foot should strike a liar, the blow should do his dogship honour; yea, Were all high titles guilt about his head, Scarce were he worthy to be spurned of me.1885, Algernon Charles Swinburne, Marino Faliero
    • In Mars' as well as Venus' wars, Ere flames attack our huts and tow'rs, and burn you dogship out of doors.1889, Thomas Bridges, Francis Grose, Homer's Iliad: A Burlesque Translation, page 183
  4. The leader of a war party.
    • Plain was it that to his dogship's way of thinking it was a very bungling fashion of doing business, thus to suffer this red barbarian to pass from under their hands, untouched by tomahawk or tooth— betraying, as it did, a weakness of feeling altogether unbeseeming warriors of the first blood like...2021, Morrison Heady, Burl

Noun (2)

dogship (plural dogships)

  1. (informal) An experimental model of an aircraft.
    • It is now planned to have complete drawing release for the pilot production AMCS units before the first missile is fired from any aircraft. (Initial firings will be from an A3 dogship).1970, United States. Congress. Senate. Government Operations, TFX Contract Investigation
    • The Sperry Gyroscope Company's DC-3 “dogship” proved the concept in test flights at the Sperry plant in Long Island, New York.2005, Malcolm J. Abzug, E. Eugene Larrabee, Airplane Stability and Control, page 103

Examples of dogship in a sentence

  • Now this is what I call the true sentiment in dogship.1845, Mrs. E. Oakes Smith, “Doghood”, in The Juvenile Gem For 1846, page 151:
  • Never deviate from the path of dogship.”2019, Aziz Nesin, Laugh or Lament, page 123:
  • Your excellency must have meant to say dogship.2023, Andrés de Claramonte y Corroy, “The Brave Black Soldier”, in Black Protagonists of Early Modern Spain:
  • After this, the Mikoyan OKB undertook a redesign of the fuel system; the changes were to be verified on the third production MiG-31, '201 Blue' (f/n 0102-01), a long-serving 'dogship'.2011, Yefim Gordon, Dmitriy Komissarov, Flight Craft 8: Mikoyan MiG-31: Defender of the Homeland, page 16:

Forms of dogship

pluraldogships

Origin of dogship

From dog + -ship.

From dog + ship.

Questions about dogship

What does dogship mean?
Dogship means the character or individuality of a dog.
How do you use dogship in a sentence?
Now this is what I call the true sentiment in dogship.
What part of speech is dogship?
Dogship is a noun.
What is the plural of dogship?
The plural of dogship is dogships.

Words near dogship in the dictionary

  1. dogsbodying
  2. dogsbreath
  3. dogsbreaths
  4. dogshank
  5. dogshanks
  6. dogship
  7. dogships
  8. dogshit
  9. dogshite
  10. dogshore
  11. dogshores

Source and license

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