Meaning & use
shell
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Meanings
nouncountable
The hard outer case that protects an egg, nut, seed, or an animal such as a snail, crab or turtle.
Grammar: Countable: a shell, two shells.
Patterns
- the shell of something
- a shell around something
She cracked the egg and picked a piece of shell out of the bowl.
We collected shells along the beach.
The turtle pulled its head back into its shell.
nouncountable
The empty outer frame of something, such as a building or vehicle, with the inside missing, damaged or not yet built.
Grammar: Often singular, with of: the shell of a burned house.
Patterns
- the shell of something
Only the shell of the old factory was left after the fire.
The company was just an empty shell with no real business.
They bought the shell of a house and finished the interior themselves.
nouncountablemilitary
A large explosive projectile fired from a gun or cannon.
Grammar: Usually used in the plural for war: shells fell on the town.
Patterns
- fire a shell
- a shell hits something
An artillery shell landed near the bridge.
The museum has a collection of shells from the First World War.
Soldiers loaded another shell into the gun.
nouncountablecomputing
A computer program that lets a user type commands to control the operating system.
Grammar: Countable: open a shell, a command shell.
Patterns
- a shell script
- open a shell
He opened a shell and typed the command to list the files.
The administrator wrote a shell script to back up the server.
Many developers prefer working in a shell to using menus.
verbtransitive
To remove the hard outer covering from something such as nuts, peas or shellfish.
Grammar: Takes an object: shell the peas.
Patterns
- shell something
We sat on the porch and shelled peas for dinner.
He shelled a handful of walnuts for the cake.
The workers shell the shrimp before freezing them.
verbtransitivemilitary
To attack a place with heavy explosive shells fired from guns.
Grammar: Takes an object: the army shelled the town.
Patterns
- shell a town
- be shelled
The artillery shelled the harbor for three days.
The village was shelled during the night.
Enemy ships shelled the coast before the landing.
Word forms
| plural | shells |
|---|---|
| third person singular | shells |
| past tense | shelled |
| past participle | shelled |
| -ing form | shelling |
Common combinations
- seashell
- The child kept a seashell on her windowsill.
- come out of your shell
- He slowly came out of his shell after joining the choir.
- eggshell
- The eggshell was thin and cracked easily.
- shell company
- Investigators found the money had passed through a shell company.
- shell shock
- Doctors once called the condition shell shock.
- shell out
- We had to shell out a lot for the repairs.
Synonyms and how they differ
- husk
- Husk is the dry outer layer of grain, corn and some seeds, while shell is harder and also covers eggs and animals.
- casing
- Casing is a general word for any protective cover, often man-made, while shell is usually a natural hard covering.
- carapace
- Carapace is the technical word for the hard upper shell of a crab or turtle, and is more scientific than shell.
- bombard
- Bombard, as a verb, means to attack with continuous heavy fire of any kind, whereas shell means to fire shells specifically.
Word family
- shellfish noun
- sea animals with a shell, eaten as food
- shelling noun
- an attack with heavy gunfire
- shelled adjective
- having its shell on or removed, as in shelled walnuts
- eggshell noun
- the hard outer layer of a bird's egg
Commonly confused: shell or she'll?
shell vs she'll
She'll is the contraction of she will, and sounds much like shell in fast speech.
Practice
Which sentence uses shell to mean attacking with heavy gunfire?
Choose one answer.
Shell as a verb meaning to bombard fits warships firing at a town. Shelling peas means removing pods, and the other options use noun senses.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “shell”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.