How to Use hippopotamus in a Sentence

hippopotamus

noun
  • Amounts that would have choked a hippopotamus two years ago now go down easy.
    — Steve Chapman, chicagotribune.com, 30 Apr. 2021
  • The problem is with the green top, which looks like a hat on the steps with a hippopotamus face.
    — David J. Neal, miamiherald, 19 Dec. 2017
  • Hong Kong alone received more than half the hippopotamus skins.
    — Rachel Fobar, National Geographic, 3 Oct. 2019
  • On the grounds of one lodge, the bones of a dwarf hippopotamus have just been uncovered.
    — Sophy Roberts, Condé Nast Traveler, 28 Mar. 2017
  • Most of the tools were made from the bones of elephants, hippopotamuses and bovids.
    — Brittney Melton, NPR, 10 Mar. 2025
  • Dump the whole moral-reality thing and write about a hippopotamus hunter.
    — David Marchese David Marchesephotograph By Mamadi Doumbouya, New York Times, 23 Nov. 2022
  • The woman was short and svelte with dark eyes, and the guy was tall, bald, and heavyish, and looked like a hippopotamus.
    — Matthew Klam, The New Yorker, 9 Mar. 2020
  • There are cougars and hippopotamuses.
    — Skyler Caruso, PEOPLE, 13 May 2026
  • Otherwise how could the hippopotamus have once been a dolphin?
    — Cynthia Ozick, The New Yorker, 14 June 2021
  • The big sister was also able to feed one of the zoo’s elephants as well as have photos ops with a hippopotamus and a pair of penguins.
    — Stephanie Petit, PEOPLE.com, 4 Apr. 2018
  • In a small zoo, a new hippopotamus called Zafari unites neighbors from clashing classes.
    — Anna Marie De La Fuente, Variety, 16 Aug. 2025
  • For ages 24 months and up, this inflatable hippopotamus pool comes equipped with a wading area and a mini slide.
    — Naveen Kumar, CNN Underscored, 29 June 2020
  • Native to West Africa, pygmy hippos are smaller cousins of the full-sized hippopotamus.
    — Kocha Olarn, CNN, 14 Sep. 2024
  • Pygmy hippos grow to only half the height of a full-size hippopotamus and weigh less than a quarter of their larger counterparts.
    — Leslie Katz, Forbes, 2 Oct. 2024
  • Sauropods were assumed to walk like elephants, but a new way to analyze footprints shows their gait was most similar to a hippopotamus.
    — Jennifer Ouellette, Ars Technica, 11 Aug. 2022
  • Martin Van Buren had tigers and Calvin Coolidge had a hippopotamus.
    — Kevin Fisher-Paulson, SFChronicle.com, 11 June 2019
  • There is a hippopotamus, a microbe, and a whole series of disembodied hairlines.
    — Cleo Levin, Slate Magazine, 24 Oct. 2017
  • The creatures, which at 2,500 pounds weighed nearly as much as a hippopotamus, were not just massive but also well-armed.
    — Theresa MacHemer, Smithsonian Magazine, 13 Feb. 2020
  • That explains why the restaurant’s mascot is a hippopotamus, but also why items like harissa and couscous play prominently on the menu.
    — Jess Fleming, Twin Cities, 16 Jan. 2017
  • Lisa Manders was killed in a hippopotamus attack during this trip while on a safari with her husband and died on June 5.
    — CBS News, 13 Feb. 2025
  • The hippopotamus — the closest living relative of whales that live outside the ocean — also has dense bones, which help weigh it down while walking along the bottom of lakes or rivers.
    — Joshua Rapp Learn, Discover Magazine, 19 Mar. 2021
  • The urban legend is that the song was recorded as a fundraiser to get a hippopotamus at a local zoo, but apparently that's not the reality.
    — Abigail Rosenthal, Chron, 1 Dec. 2021
  • Finds include a 5,000-year-old horse tooth, many species of ancient and extinct sharks, sea lions and a hippopotamus, Thomae said.
    — Tom Stienstra, SFChronicle.com, 27 Oct. 2019
  • Most of the animals were shipped away, but the four hippopotamuses—of which Escobar was especially fond—were left to fend for themselves in a pond.
    — National Geographic, 31 Jan. 2020
  • Gigantic leatherback turtles, topping out at about 2,000 pounds, nest along the beaches, while hippopotamuses body surf in the waves.
    — Alexandra Wexler, WSJ, 9 May 2018
  • There were also strips of papyrus with depictions of the goddess Taweret depicted as a hippopotamus with the tail of a crocodile.
    — BostonGlobe.com, 24 Nov. 2019
  • Zoo Atlanta didn't get a hippopotamus for Christmas — but another large mammal had a baby, just in time for the holiday.
    — Aliza Chasan, CBS News, 28 Dec. 2023
  • Christel Krueger peered through thick glass and murky water at the Berlin Zoo, staring in awe at a mother hippopotamus and her child sleeping on a sandbar.
    — ABC News, 21 Apr. 2026
  • Graeter's has put the two together, with an ice cream inspired by Fiona, the Cincinnati Zoo's popular baby hippopotamus.
    — Polly Campbell, Cincinnati.com, 17 July 2017
  • These animals ranged in weight from a few pounds to about 4,000 pounds, with the largest among them similar in bulk to a modern hippopotamus or rhinoceros.
    — Kohei Tanaka, National Geographic, 15 May 2018

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'hippopotamus.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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