“egg” – English explanatory dictionary

noun 1. an oval object with a hard shell, produced by a female bird or reptile, from which a baby comes ○ The owl laid three eggs in the nest. ○ Turtles lay their eggs in the sand. 2. a chicken’s egg, used as food ○ You need three eggs to make this cake. □ boiled egg an egg which has been cooked by boiling in water □ poached egg an egg which is taken out of its shell, cooked whole in hot water and often eaten on toast at breakfast □ don’t put all your eggs in one basket don’t risk everything on only one project 3. a reproductive cell produced by a female, which is fertilised by sperm from a male ○ Doctors implanted a fertilised egg in her womb.

or EGG ON, to excite, stimulate, or provoke one person to quarrel
with another, &c. From the Anglo-Saxon _eggian_; or possibly a
corruption of EDGE, or EDGE ON, or even from _agere_, to
drive.—_Ancient._

n. [OE., fr. Icel. egg; akin to AS. aeg (whence OE. ey), Sw. ägg, Dan. aeg, G. & D. ei, and prob. to OSlav. aje, jaje, L. ovum, Gr. ’w,o•n, Ir. ugh, Gael. ubh, and perh. to L. avis bird. Cf. Oval.]
1. (Popularly) The oval or roundish body laid by domestic poultry and other birds, tortoises, etc. It consists of a yolk, usually surrounded by the ´white´ or albumen, and inclosed in a shell or strong membrane.
2. (Biol.) A simple cell, from the development of which the young of animals are formed; ovum; germ cell.
3. Anything resembling an egg in form. Egg is used adjectively, or as the first part of self-explaining compounds; as egg beater or egg- beater, egg case, egg ladle, egg-shaped, etc. Egg and anchor (Arch.), an egg-shaped ornament, alternating with another in the form of a dart, used to enrich the ovolo; — called also egg and dart, and egg and tongue. See Anchor, n., 5. Ogilvie. — Egg cleavage (Biol.), a process of cleavage or segmentation, by which the egg undergoes endogenous division with formation of a mass of nearly similar cells, from the growth and differentiation of which the new organism is ultimately formed. See Segmentation of the ovum, under Segmentation. — Egg development (Biol.), the process of the development of an egg, by which the embryo is formed. — Egg mite (Zoöl.), any mite which devours the eggs of insects, as Nothrus ovivorus, which destroys those of the canker worm. — Egg parasite (Zoöl.), any small hymenopterous insect, which, in the larval stage, lives within the eggs of other insects. Many genera and species are known.

v. t. [imp. & p. p. Egged p. pr. & vb. n. Egging ] [OE. eggen, Icel. eggja, fr. egg edge. . See Edge.] To urge on; to instigate; to incite “Adam and Eve he egged to ill.” Piers Plowman. “[She] did egg him on to tell
How fair she was.” Warner.