Noun

(en-plural noun)

What is left after a person (or any organism) dies; a corpse.

The victim's remains were one small piece of bone.

Historical or archaeological relics.

(senseid)The extant writings of a deceased person.

All that is left of the stock of some things; remnants.

* {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham)

, title=(The China Governess) , chapter=Foreword citation , passage=Everything a living animal could do to destroy and to desecrate bed and walls had been done. […]  A canister of flour from the kitchen had been thrown at the looking-glass and lay like trampled snow over the remains of a decent blue suit with the lining ripped out which lay on top of the ruin of a plastic wardrobe.}}

(rare)  .

Noun

(en-noun)

(anatomy) The system that provides support to an organism, internal and made up of bones and cartilage in vertebrates, external in some other animals.

* 1883 , ,

At the foot of a pretty big pine, and involved in a green creeper, which had even partly lifted some of the smaller bones, a human skeleton lay, with a few shreds of clothing, on the ground.

A frame that provides support to a building or other construction.

(figuratively) A very thin person.

She lost so much weight while she was ill that she became a skeleton.

(From the sled used, which originally was a bare frame, like a skeleton.) A type of tobogganing in which competitors lie face down, and descend head first (compare luge). See

(computing) A client-helper procedure that communicates with a stub.

RMI Nomenclature: in RMI, the client helper is a 'stub' and the service helper is a 'skeleton'.

(geometry) The vertices and edges of a polyhedron, taken collectively.

An anthropomorphic representation of a skeleton. See

She dressed up as a skeleton for Halloween.

(figuratively) The central core of something that gives shape to the entire structure.

The skeleton of the organisation is essentially the same as it was ten years ago, but many new faces have come and gone.