Pl. 4–6 in Latin form, bisontes, bisountes; sing. 7– bison. [Adopted, directly or through F. bison, (Cotgr., 1611) from L. bison (pl. bisontes), ad. OTeut. *wisand, wisund str, masc., the native name, in OHG. wisunt, -ant, -int, MHG. wisant, -ent, -en, MGer. wesant, OE. wesend, ON. visundr, pl. visundar (with i afterwards lengthened). The Old English wesend having been long obsolete, the word has come back to us through Latin, in which guise it can hardly be looked upon as Eng. before the 17th c., and has become familiar only in connection with the American Bison. It is in Minsheu, Coles, Phillips 1678–1706, and Kersey; but not in Cockeram, Blount, Bailey, 1721–90, Johnson, nor Richardson 1836–55: it was added by Todd to Johnson, 1818. Etymologically bi·sən is the most correct, but bəi·sən is the prevailing pronunciation.]
The name of two species of Wild Oxen, which some naturalists separate from the genus Bos, and make a distinct genus Bison or Bonasus.
1. orig. A species of Wild Ox (Bos Bison Gesn., B. bonasus Linn.), formerly prevalent in Europe, including Great Britain, and still existing in a protected state in forests of Lithuania. (This was the βίσων of Pausanias and Oppian, the βόνασος of Aristotle and Ælian, the bĭson and bonāsus of Pliny and Solinus, the bison of Seneca and Martial; pl. bisontes, in later writers visontes, vesontes, bissontes. It is now sometimes called the Aurochs, a name belonging rightly to the extinct Bos Urus, the Urus of Cæsar. See the exhaustive article Wisunt, in Schade, Altdeutsches Wbch.)
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., XV. xxx. (1495), 499. There ben many bestes of dyuers kynde in Beme [= Bohemia] as beeres, hartes … bubali and bisontes. Ibid., XV. lxxxiii. (1495), 521. In Karinthia ben many beers, bysountes and other wonderful beestis.
1601. Holland, Pliny, II. 323. Those neat or buffles called uri or bisontes.
1611. Bible, Deut. xiv. 5. The pygarg [marg. bison], and the wild ox, and the chamois.
1617. Minsheu, s.v. Bíson, a wilde oxe, great eied, broad-faced, that will neuer be tamed.
1661. Lovell, Hist. Anim. & Min., 23. Hereto may be referred the Bison: and Ure-oxe.
1860. Gosse, Rom. Nat. Hist., 203. In the forests of Lithuania there yet linger a few herds of another enormous ox, which at one time roamed over the whole of Europe, including even the British Isles—the European bison.
2. The North American species B. Americanus, popularly called ‘Buffalo,’ which roams in vast herds over the interior of the continent, chiefly in the neighborhood of the Rocky Mountains.
[1693. Ray, Synops. Animal., 71. Bison … hujusmodi bovem aliquando vidimus in vivario regio Westmonasteriensi unde allatum nescio; ni forte ex Florida regione Americana.]
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist., II. 12.
1777. Robertson, Hist. Amer. (1783), II. 107. The bison of America.
1810. Campbell, Poems, II. 16. We launch’d our quivers for the bison chace.
1841. Catlin, N. Amer. Ind. (1844), I. iv. 24. The buffalo (or more correctly speaking bison) is a noble animal, that roams over the prairies.
1877. J. Allen, Amer. Bison, 449. The height of the American bison … is found to be sixty-six inches.
