ˈkämə̇t, usu- ə̇d.+V noun
( -s )
Etymology: Middle English comete, from Old English cometa, from Latin cometa, cometes, from Greek komētēs, literally, long-haired, from koman to wear long hair, from komē hair
1. : a nebulous celestial body that consists of a fuzzy head usually surrounding a bright nucleus, that often when in the part of its orbit near the sun develops a long tail which points away from the sun because of radiation pressure, that has an orbit varying in eccentricity between nearly round and parabolic, that has an inclination from zero to 180 degrees, and that has a period from three to thousands of years
2.
[probably translation of French comète; from the picture of a comet on one of the cards]
a. : a card game that is a form of stops
b. : the nine of clubs or nine of diamonds when assigned special values in this game
3. sometimes capitalized : a goldfish of a fancy breed
4. : one of a class of racing sloops similar to the star boat but smaller in size
5. : one that rapidly attains high position but fails to retain it