a. [f. L. bilingu-is speaking two languages (f. bi- two + lingua tongue, language) + -AL 1.]
1. Having, or characterized by two languages.
1862. Ansted, Channel Isl., 543. A constitution of bilingual islands.
1871. Earle, Philol., § 20. Cock-boat is probably a bilingual compound.
2. spec. Of inscriptions, etc.: Written or inscribed simultaneously in parallel versions in two different languages. Also quasi-sb.
1847. Grote, Greece, II. xxxiv. IV. 352. The inscriptions were bilingual, in Assyrian characters as well as Greek.
1869. J. D. Baldwin, Preh. Nations, viii. (1877), 340. The bilingual stone of Thugga.
1881. Athenæum, 1 Oct., 433/3. Our bilinguals are as yet scanty.
Hence Bilingually adv., in two languages. So Bilinguar a. = BILINGUAL. Bilinguist, one who speaks two languages. Bilinguous a. = BILINGUAL.
1871. Earle, Philol., § 77. Not an unfrequent thing in Chaucer for a line to contain a single fact bilingually repeated.
1839. Fraser’s Mag., XX. 202. The bilinguar monument of Rosetta.
1884. Pall Mall Gaz., 4 Jan., 3/1. A genuine bilinguist is as rare a prodigy as a two-headed calf.
1730. Bailey, Bilinguous; (whence also in mod. Dicts.).
