Belly vs Nelly - What's the difference?
belly | nelly |
As a noun belly is the abdomen. As a verb belly is to position one's belly. As a proper noun nelly is a spelling variant of nellie, a diminutive of the female given names eleanor and helen.
belly English
Noun
( bellies)
The abdomen.
- (Dunglison)
The stomach, especially a fat one.
The womb.
* Bible, Jer. i. 5
- Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee.
The lower fuselage of an airplane.
* 1994 , Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom , Abacus 2010, p. 454:
- There was no heat, and we shivered in the belly of the plane.
The part of anything which resembles the human belly in protuberance or in cavity; the innermost part.
- the belly of a flask, muscle, sail, or ship
* Bible, Jonah ii. 2
- Out of the belly of hell cried I.
(architecture) The hollow part of a curved or bent timber, the convex part of which is the back.
Derived terms
* beer belly
* bellyache
* belly button/belly-button
* belly dance/belly-dance
* belly dancer/belly-dancer
* belly dancing
* belly flop, bellyflop
* bellyful
* belly laugh/belly-laugh
* bellyless
* bellylike
* belly of the beast
* Delhi belly
* fire in the belly
* sawbelly
* sharpbelly
Usage notes
* Formerly, all the splanchnic or visceral cavities were called bellies: the lower belly being the abdomen; the middle belly, the thorax; and the upper belly, the head.
See also
* have eyes bigger than one's belly
* abdomen
* bouk
* stomach
* tummy
Verb
To position one's belly.
To swell and become protuberant; to bulge.
* Dryden
- The bellying canvas strutted with the gale.
To cause to swell out; to fill.
* Shakespeare
- Your breath of full consent bellied his sails.
Derived terms
* belly up
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nelly English
Etymology 1
Shortened from Nelly Duff'', for ''puff'', i.e. breath of ''life
Noun
(-) (not used in the plural)
(Cockney rhyming slang) Life.
Usage notes
* Used principally in the phrase (not on your nelly).
Etymology 2
From the woman's name, Nelly
Noun
(nellies)
(derogatory, slang) An effeminate homosexual man.
(British, slang) A silly person.
A common name for the giant petrels, Macronectes giganteus'' and ''Macronectes halli
Hyponyms
* (petrel) Antarctic giant petrel, northern piant petrel, southern giant fulmar, southern giant petrel
Adjective
(er)
(slang) Unmanly, effeminate.
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