reindeer

From Middle English [Term?], from Old Norse hreindýri (“reindeer”), from hreinn + dýr (“animal”).

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈɹeɪndɪə/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈɹeɪndɪɹ/

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• Hyphenation: rein‧deer

reindeer (plural reindeers or reindeer)

1. An Arctic and subarctic-dwelling deer of the species Rangifer tarandus, with a number of subspecies.
   • 1768, D[aniel] Fenning, “LAPLAND”, in The Royal English Dictionary; or, A Treasury of the English Language, 3rd improved edition, London: Printed for R. Baldwin, Hawes and Co., T. Caslon, S. Crowder, J. Johnson, Wilson and Fell, Robinson and Roberts, and B. Collins, OCLC 22419759:

     Here is a prodigious number of wild beaſts, as ſtags, bears, wolves, foxes of various colours, martens, hares, glittens, beavers, otters, elk, and rein deer: the latter is leſs than a stag.

   • 2013 March, Nancy Langston, “Mining the Boreal North”, in American Scientist‎, volume 101, number 2, archived from the original on 13 April 2016, page 98:

     Reindeer are well suited to the taiga’s frigid winters. They can maintain a thermogradient between body core and the environment of up to 100 degrees, in part because of insulation provided by their fur, and in part because of counter-current vascular heat exchange systems in their legs and nasal passages.

• caribou

• reindeer on Wikipedia.Wikipedia