kittens

Noun

kitten (plural kittens)

1. A young cat, especially before sexual maturity (reached at about seven months).
   • It was supposed to have happened thus: the cat had young kittens, and frequently carried them mice, and other animals its prey, and among the rest a young rat: the kittens, not being hungry, played with it, and when the cat came to give suck to the kittens, the rat likewise sucked her.1752 January, The London Magazine, and Monthly Chronologer, page 243&244

   Synonyms:

   catling, kit, kitling, kitty, kitty cat

2. A young rabbit, rat, hedgehog, squirrel, fox, beaver, badger, etc.
   • The first move at beaver raising in North Dakota had its starting in the fall of 1874, when a kitten beaver was taken out of Mandan Lake by the writer and given to a little Indian girl who then lived with her guardians at Pretty Point near the present village of Sanger, Oliver county.1906, Joseph Henry Taylor, Beavers, Their Ways, and Other Sketches, page 49
3. A moth of the genus Furcula.
   • Two of these formed cocoons in a manner I have not seen before. They were supplied when full-grown with plenty of rotten willow wood, which I have always found a most suitable material for insects using bark or old wood in forming cocoons such as the kittens, Apatele alni, etc., and most made the...1959, Odonata reprints: J. G. Needham collection, volume 3, page 657
4. (colloquial) A term of endearment, especially for a woman.
   • Speak only when spoken to, kitten.1995, Duckman, "America the Beautiful" (season 2, episode 5)
   1. (broadly, colloquial) A girlfriend.

See all 6 meanings of kitten