locust

plural locusts

1. Any of the grasshoppers, often polyphenic and usually swarming, in the family Acrididae that are very destructive to crops and other vegetation, especially migratory locusts (Locusta migratoria).First known use 14th c.
2. historicalA fruit or pod of a carob tree (Ceratonia siliqua).First known use 16th c.

   Among other articles, they brought with them a great quantity of locusts, which are a kind of pulse, sweet and pleasant to the palate, and in shape resembling French beans, but longer.

   1789, Olaudah Equiano, chapter 9, in The Interesting Narrative, volume I

3. Any of various often leguminous trees and shrubs, especially of the genera Robinia and Gleditsia; locust tree.First known use 17th c.
4. A cicada.First known use 18th c.
5. Hong KongderogatoryethnicoffensiveslurA mainlander.
6. UKobsoleteslangA dose of laudanum.

   I took my flogging like a stone. If I had sung, some of the convicts would have given me some lush with a locust in it (laudanum hocussing), and when I was asleep would have given me a crack on the head that would have laid me straight.

   1851, Henry Mayhew, London Labour and the London Poor, published 1861

present singular third person locusts · participle present locusting · participle past locusted · past locusted

1. intransitiveTo come in a swarm.

   This Philip and the black-faced swarms of Spain, The hardest, cruellest people in the world, Come locusting upon us, eat us up, Confiscate lands, goods, money […]

   1875, Alfred Tennyson, Queen Mary: A Drama, London: Henry S. King & Co., →OCLC, (please specify the page)

plural Locusts

1. A surname.