noun. Any of various marine and freshwater fishes chiefly of the family Cottidae, having a large flattened head with spines, few or no scales, and often fanlike pectoral fins.

noun. A scorpionfish (Scorpaena guttata) of California coastal waters.

noun. A callionymoid fish, Callionymus lyra, having at the angle of the preoperculum a strong compressed dentate spine; a dragonet: more fully called yellow sculpin. See dragonet, 2, and cut under Callionymus.

noun. A mean or mischief-making fellow.

noun. A cottoid fish, especially of the genus Cottus (or Acanthocottus), as C. scorpius of the northern Atlantic; C. grœnlandicus, the daddysculpin; C. æneus, the grubby of the New England and New York coasts.

noun. A hemitripteroid fish, Hemitripterus acadianus, occurring in deeper water than the true sculpins off the northeastern coast of America. Also called deep-water sculpin, yellow sculpin, and sea-raven. See cut under sea-raven.

noun. A scorpænoid fish, Scorpæna guttata, of the southern Californian coast, there called scorpene. See cut under Scorpæna.

noun. Any one of numerous species of marine cottoid fishes of the genus Cottus, or Acanthocottus, having a large head armed with several sharp spines, and a broad mouth. They are generally mottled with yellow, brown, and black. Several species are found on the Atlantic coasts of Europe and America.

noun. A large cottoid market fish of California (Scorpænichthys marmoratus); -- called also bighead, cabezon, scorpion, salpa.

noun. The dragonet, or yellow sculpin, of Europe (Callionymus lyra).

noun. the sea raven.

noun. A small fish of the family Cottidae, usually lacking scales. Often found on river bottoms and in tidal pools.

noun. any of numerous spiny large-headed usually scaleless scorpaenoid fishes with broad mouths

"I wuz wid yer gran'pa at Fort Mimms, down erbout Mobile, an 'I seed 'em killin' folks an 'sculpin' uv 'em; an, mo'n dat, ef'n I hadn't er crope under er log, an 'flattent myse'f out like er allergator, dey'd er got me; an' den, ergin, dey don't talk like no folks."

arctic sculpin  black sculpin  european sculpin  great sculpin  long-spined sculpin  

scorpaenoid  scorpaenoid fish  

bullhead  grubby  hemitripterus americanus  miller's thumb  myxocephalus aenaeus  

bighead  cabezon  salpa  scorpion