Prickle
collective noun /ˈprɪkəl/ — What you call a group of porcupines — simple, perfect, slightly funny.
Definition
The collective noun for a group of porcupines. Porcupines are mostly solitary animals, but when they do gather, the collective noun captures exactly what you'd feel if you got too close.
Beyond the definition
Simple, perfect, and slightly funny. A prickle of porcupines needs no explanation — it tells you everything about what makes them what they are. It's one of those collective nouns that makes you wonder how anyone settled for anything less exact.
Origin & history
From Old English prica — a point, a sharp thing. Porcupine quills are modified hairs stiffened with keratin. A single porcupine has around 30,000 of them — a prickle, by any measure.
Example sentences
Illustrative sentences for learning, not verified community posts or sourced quotations.
A prickle of porcupines had stripped the bark from the young trees overnight.
The dog retreated from the prickle, wiser than it had been five minutes before.
A prickle moved through the underbrush, each animal its own small fortress.
How to use it
Follow this entry’s examples for grammatical form and sentence placement.
Choose “Prickle” when the meaning fits your context: The collective noun for a group of porcupines. Porcupines are mostly solitary animals, but when they do gather, the collective noun captures exactly what you'd feel if you got too close.
Synonyms
group, cluster, band
Related words
Word in the Wild
Illustrative story: an imagined scene, not a documented event or interview.
The wildlife photographer had been in many uncomfortable positions in thirty years — half-submerged, sunburnt, cold, bitten. But lying on his stomach in a Welsh wood at midnight trying to photograph a prickle of hedgehogs without disturbing them was the situation he most often described.
The hedgehogs had their own agenda. They moved in directions unrelated to photographic opportunity. One of them walked directly over his boot without apparently noticing him.
The word "prickle" had seemed playful until that night in the dark, surrounded by small animals with absolute indifference to his plans. Then it seemed simply right.
Questions about this word
What does "Prickle" mean?
Prickle is collective noun meaning: What you call a group of porcupines — simple, perfect, slightly funny.. The collective noun for a group of porcupines. Porcupines are mostly solitary animals, but when they do gather, the collective noun captures exactly what you'd feel if you got too close.
Where does the word "Prickle" come from?
From Old English prica — a point, a sharp thing. Porcupine quills are modified hairs stiffened with keratin. A single porcupine has around 30,000 of them — a prickle, by any measure.