noun
- Zoology. the fat layer between the skin and muscle of whales and other cetaceans, from which oil is made.
- excess body fat.
- an act of weeping noisily and without restraint.
verb (used without object)
- to weep noisily and without restraint: Stop blubbering and tell me what’s wrong.
verb (used with object)
- to say, especially incoherently, while weeping: The child seemed to be blubbering something about a lost ring.
- to contort or disfigure (the features) with weeping.
adjective
- disfigured with blubbering; blubbery: She dried her blubber eyes.
- fatty; swollen; puffed out (usually used in combination): thick, blubber lips; blubber-faced.
verb
- to sob without restraint
- to utter while sobbing
- (tr) to make (the face) wet and swollen or disfigured by crying
noun
- a thick insulating layer of fatty tissue below the skin of aquatic mammals such as the whale: used by man as a source of oil
- informal excessive and flabby body fat
- the act or an instance of weeping without restraint
- Australian an informal name for jellyfish
adjective
- (often in combination) swollen or fleshyblubber-faced; blubber-lips
c.1400, present participle adjective from blubber (v.). Originally of fountains, springs, etc.; of weeping, from 1580s. As a verbal noun, from 1570s.
late 14c., blober “a bubble, bubbling water; foaming waves,” probably echoic of bubbling water. Original notion of “bubbling, foaming” survives in the figurative verbal meaning “to weep, cry” (c.1400). Meaning “whale fat” first attested 1660s; earlier it was used in reference to jellyfish (c.1600) and of whale oil (mid-15c.). As an adjective from 1660s.
late 14c., “to seethe, bubble,” from blubber (n.). Meaning “to cry, to overflow with weeping” is from c.1400. Related: Blubbered; blubbering.
- The thick layer of fat between the skin and the muscle layers of whales and other marine mammals. It insulates the animal from heat loss and serves as a food reserve.