▪ a large American wild cat with a plain tawny to greyish coat, found from Canada to Patagonia; a puma.
Word OriginMiddle English: from Old French pantere, from Latin panthera, from Greek panthēr. In Latin, pardus ‘leopard’ also existed; the two terms led to confusion: until the mid 19th century many taxonomists regarded the panther and the leopard as separate species.
