Word.ws English Dictionary

horse-leeches

horse-leeches is the plural of horse-leech.

Meaning of horse-leech

Noun

horse-leech (plural horse-leeches)

  1. A type of sucking worm, Haemopis sanguisuga, larger than the common leech.
    • Some use horse-leeches behind the ears, and apply opium to the place.1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition II...
  2. (obsolete) A veterinarian for horses.

Questions about horse-leeches

What is horse-leeches the plural of?
Horse-leeches is the plural of horse-leech.

Words near horse-leeches in the dictionary

  1. horse-hung
  2. horse-jockey
  3. horse-jockeys
  4. horse-latitudes
  5. horse-leech
  6. horse-leeches
  7. horse-like
  8. horse-litter
  9. horse-litters
  10. horse-lock
  11. horse-locks

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: horse-leeches (page history and authors); horse-leech (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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