spermaceti
/ˌspɜːməˈsiːti/US/spɚməˈsiːti/
spermaceti noun: a wax obtained from the head of sperm whales and used to make cosmetics, etc; humans separate it out from sperm oil.
Noun
spermaceti (uncountable)
- A wax obtained from the head of sperm whales and used to make cosmetics, etc; humans separate it out from sperm oil.
- Holonym: sperm oil
- Moreover, as that of Heidelburgh was always replenished with the most excellent of the wines of the Rhenish valleys, so the tun of the whale contains by far the most precious of all his oily vintages; namely, the highly-prized spermaceti, in its absolutely pure, limpid, and odoriferous state.1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 77, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC
spermaceti meaning in Tagalog
spermaceti in Tagalog
- wax obtained from the head of sperm whale
- esperma
Origin of spermaceti
From Latin sperma (“sperm”) + Latin cētī (“of the whale”, genitive of cētus).
Words formed from spermaceti
Phrases with spermaceti
Questions about spermaceti
- What does spermaceti mean?
- Spermaceti means a wax obtained from the head of sperm whales and used to make cosmetics, etc; humans separate it out from sperm oil.
- What is spermaceti in Tagalog?
- Spermaceti in Tagalog is esperma. See Spermaceti meaning in Tagalog.
- What part of speech is spermaceti?
- Spermaceti is a noun.
- How do you pronounce spermaceti?
- Spermaceti is pronounced /ˌspɜːməˈsiːti/ (UK).
Words near spermaceti in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: spermaceti (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-spermaceti.wav.
Cite this entry: “spermaceti.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/spermaceti. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.