How to Use hippopotamus in a Sentence

hippopotamus

noun
Definition of hippopotamusnext
  • The problem is with the green top, which looks like a hat on the steps with a hippopotamus face.
    — David J. Neal, miamiherald, 19 Dec. 2017
  • On the grounds of one lodge, the bones of a dwarf hippopotamus have just been uncovered.
    — Sophy Roberts, Condé Nast Traveler, 28 Mar. 2017
  • The woman was short and svelte with dark eyes, and the guy was tall, bald, and heavyish, and looked like a hippopotamus.
    — Matthew Klam, The New Yorker, 9 Mar. 2020
  • Amounts that would have choked a hippopotamus two years ago now go down easy.
    — Steve Chapman, chicagotribune.com, 30 Apr. 2021
  • Hong Kong alone received more than half the hippopotamus skins.
    — Rachel Fobar, National Geographic, 3 Oct. 2019
  • One famous story has to do with the hippopotamus’ tail.
    — San Diego Union-Tribune, 20 Oct. 2020
  • The big sister was also able to feed one of the zoo’s elephants as well as have photos ops with a hippopotamus and a pair of penguins.
    — Stephanie Petit, PEOPLE.com, 4 Apr. 2018
  • The Dallas Zoo just welcomed a healthy new hippopotamus!
    — Bailey Richards, Peoplemag, 9 Nov. 2022
  • Martin Van Buren had tigers and Calvin Coolidge had a hippopotamus.
    — Kevin Fisher-Paulson, SFChronicle.com, 11 June 2019
  • Dump the whole moral-reality thing and write about a hippopotamus hunter.
    — David Marchese David Marchesephotograph By Mamadi Doumbouya, New York Times, 23 Nov. 2022
  • For ages 24 months and up, this inflatable hippopotamus pool comes equipped with a wading area and a mini slide.
    — Naveen Kumar, CNN Underscored, 29 June 2020
  • Finds include a 5,000-year-old horse tooth, many species of ancient and extinct sharks, sea lions and a hippopotamus, Thomae said.
    — Tom Stienstra, SFChronicle.com, 27 Oct. 2019
  • The creatures, which at 2,500 pounds weighed nearly as much as a hippopotamus, were not just massive but also well-armed.
    — Theresa MacHemer, Smithsonian Magazine, 13 Feb. 2020
  • Otherwise how could the hippopotamus have once been a dolphin?
    — Cynthia Ozick, The New Yorker, 14 June 2021
  • Carved ivory upper and lower dentures (18th century) The first dentures were made of hippopotamus ivory, which was thought to be more durable.
    — Roslyn Sulcas, New York Times, 7 June 2018
  • Among those seeking refuge were herds of hippopotamuses.
    — Popular Science, 13 May 2020
  • Gigantic leatherback turtles, topping out at about 2,000 pounds, nest along the beaches, while hippopotamuses body surf in the waves.
    — Alexandra Wexler, WSJ, 9 May 2018
  • The hippopotamus — the closest living relative of whales that live outside the ocean — also has dense bones, which help weigh it down while walking along the bottom of lakes or rivers.
    — Joshua Rapp Learn, Discover Magazine, 19 Mar. 2021
  • Sauropods were assumed to walk like elephants, but a new way to analyze footprints shows their gait was most similar to a hippopotamus.
    — Jennifer Ouellette, Ars Technica, 11 Aug. 2022
  • These animals ranged in weight from a few pounds to about 4,000 pounds, with the largest among them similar in bulk to a modern hippopotamus or rhinoceros.
    — Kohei Tanaka, National Geographic, 15 May 2018
  • Most of the animals were shipped away, but the four hippopotamuses—of which Escobar was especially fond—were left to fend for themselves in a pond.
    — National Geographic, 31 Jan. 2020
  • A large number of hippopotamuses have been killed in the western part of Niger after villagers blamed them for destroying crops and livestock.
    — Fox News, 13 July 2017
  • That explains why the restaurant’s mascot is a hippopotamus, but also why items like harissa and couscous play prominently on the menu.
    — Jess Fleming, Twin Cities, 16 Jan. 2017
  • Graeter's has put the two together, with an ice cream inspired by Fiona, the Cincinnati Zoo's popular baby hippopotamus.
    — Polly Campbell, Cincinnati.com, 17 July 2017
  • Begemot is the Russian word for hippopotamus, and behemoth.
    — Sam Patten, WIRED, 14 Aug. 2019
  • There is a hippopotamus, a microbe, and a whole series of disembodied hairlines.
    — Cleo Levin, Slate Magazine, 24 Oct. 2017
  • The urban legend is that the song was recorded as a fundraiser to get a hippopotamus at a local zoo, but apparently that's not the reality.
    — Abigail Rosenthal, Chron, 1 Dec. 2021
  • Hip, Hippo, Hooray is the first of two books about Fiona, the first Nile hippopotamus in captivity to survive being born six weeks prematurely.
    — Katie Vogel, USA TODAY, 10 Oct. 2017
  • There were also strips of papyrus with depictions of the goddess Taweret depicted as a hippopotamus with the tail of a crocodile.
    — BostonGlobe.com, 24 Nov. 2019
  • Other winners include a shot taken in South Africa of a hippopotamus appearing to get ready to take a bite out of a heron standing on the back of another hippopotamus.
    — Joseph De Avila, WSJ, 8 Dec. 2022

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'hippopotamus.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Last Updated: