Panther

How to spell panther

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce panther

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does panther mean?

1. nounA large wild cat, especially a black leopard or jaguar, and in North America a puma or cougar.

Panther in a sentence

• The zoo introduced a sleek black panther to its big-cat enclosure.

• Hikers in the mountains reported seeing a panther stalking the ridge at dusk.

Where does panther come from?

Language of origin: Greek

The word came into English from the Greek panthēr, the name for a large spotted wild cat, which passed into Latin as panthera and then through Old French as pantere before reaching Middle English in the 1200s. Ancient writers were charmed by the idea that the Greek name combined pan, meaning 'all', with thēr, meaning 'beast', as if the animal were the beast above all beasts; this is almost certainly a folk etymology, since the true source is probably an older word borrowed from an Eastern language, possibly related to a Sanskrit term for a tiger or yellow animal. The genuine origin is uncertain, but the classical spelling with 'th' has stuck firmly in English. Because the 'th' here represents the Greek letter theta, the word is spelled with 'th' rather than a plain 't', which is the small trap for writers. The same panthera root survives today in the scientific genus name Panthera, which covers lions, tigers, leopards, and jaguars.

How the word is built

• panther (from Greek panthēr: a large wild cat); folk-linked to pan- (all)
• thēr (beast)