[ad. L. colubrin-us like a snake, cunning, f. colubr(i)- snake. Cf. F. colubrin.]
1. Of, belonging to, or characteristic of a snake or serpent; snake-like.
a. 1528. Skelton, Image Ipocr., Wks. II. 290. His county pallantyne Have coustome colubryne With code viperyne, And sectes serpentyne.
1730–6. Bailey (folio), Colubrine, of or belonging to a Serpent; also wily, crafty.
1883. P. Robinson, in Harper’s Mag., Oct., 708/1. The colubrine impossibility of springing off the ground at me.
2. Zool. Of the nature of the Coluber or snake: applied to serpents, sometimes distinguished as true colubrine and venomous colubrine snakes.
1844–58. Günther (title), Catalogue of Colubrine Snakes, Lizards, &c., in the British Museum.
1860. Dallas, Nat. Hist. Animal Kingd., 382. The fangs of the Colubrine Snakes … are always immoveably fixed in the mouth.
1871. T. Holmes, Syst. Surg. (ed. 2), V. 939. The Colubrine Snakes … differ in several important particulars from the Viperina.
1887. Günther, in Encycl. Brit., XXII. 193. Venomous Colubrine snakes.
B. sb. 1. A colubrine snake. [So F. colubrin.]
† 2. Min. A talcose mineral. Obs.
1771. Hill, Fossils, 28. Talc, Genus VI. Colubrine. Composed of small, flat, thick, even and close-connected Flakes. Ibid., 30. All the Colubrines cut easily, but will take no polish.
