eyelash

UK/ˈaɪlæʃ/US/ˈaɪlæʃ/

nounB2Occasional — familiar, but not everyday · #8,769 of 15,258leans spoken

Other forms: eyelashes

An eyelash is one of the short hairs along the edge of an eyelid. Long eyelashes, an eyelash in my eye, flutter her eyelashes.

They are not decoration: they trigger a blink when touched and they cut the airflow across the eye, which slows drying — a measured effect that holds across many mammals. Each one lives a few months and falls out on its own.

Definitions of eyelash

1nouneyelashOne of the short hairs on the edge of an eyelid.B2
“She blinked hard as an eyelash fell into her eye.”

eyelash is a hair.

Where it comes from

Eye plus lash. Lash in this sense is Middle English, of uncertain origin, perhaps imitative.

From eye + lash.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in Body & Health

Practise this word

eyelash in the wild

The crested gecko (Correlophus ciliatus), also known commonly as the eyelash gecko, is a species of lizard in the family Diplodactylidae.
Crested gecko
The primary cause is bacteria and inflammation from congested meibomian oil glands at the base of each eyelash.
Blepharitis
Affected individuals may also feel that there is something, such as an eyelash, in the eye and frequently have redness of the nose and cheeks as well.
Ocular rosacea
In many cases, removal of the affected eyelashes with forceps resolves the symptoms, although the problem often recurs in a few weeks when the eyelashes regrow.
Trichiasis
A distichia is when cilia (eyelashes) arise from the free lid margin.
Distichia

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

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