Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • An order of Hexapoda, or of the class Insecta proper, having the posterior pair of membranous wings sheathed by the hardened anterior pair called elytra, which when folded together usually form a nearly complete covering of the body; the sheath-winged insects or beetles.
  • noun Plural of coleopteron.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun plural (Zoöl.) An order of insects having the anterior pair of wings (elytra) hard and horny, and serving as coverings for the posterior pair, which are membranous, and folded transversely under the others when not in use. The mouth parts form two pairs of jaws (mandibles and maxillæ) adapted for chewing. Most of the Coleoptera are known as beetles and weevils.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun beetles

Etymologies

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Examples

  • The green beetle can be both green and a member of the coleoptera, just as a writer such as Melville can be a world traveler and influenced by the German Romantics, but also the author of a book that forms one of the gigantic foundation stones of "American Literature."

    Archive 2009-07-01 Rus Bowden 2009

  • The green beetle can be both green and a member of the coleoptera, just as a writer such as Melville can be a world traveler and influenced by the German Romantics, but also the author of a book that forms one of the gigantic foundation stones of "American Literature."

    News at Eleven: Nations can't be ignored as factors, Rus Bowden 2009

  • The Beetles are insects from the group coleoptera.

    Buddy Holly "got as close as anyone has to the essence of rock 'n' roll...." Ann Althouse 2009

  • Many coleoptera of the family Pasalidae are also endemic to the Sierra Madre del Sur, which is also one the richest areas in butterfly species (161 species) in the Mexican Pacific.

    Sierra Madre del Sur pine-oak forests 2007

  • Assemblages of fossil coleoptera (beetles) have been obtained from eight sites in southern England that date from the early phase (Pinus — Quercetum mixtum — Corylus pollen assemblage zone) of the Eemian (Ipswichian) interglacial Stage.

    Bürger and Cubasch: Are multiproxy climate reconstructions robust? « Climate Audit 2005

  • In the forest itself the only common and conspicuous coleoptera were two tiger beetles.

    The Malay Archipelago 2004

  • Some of the coleoptera and of the small and nameless insects make small holes or cells of mud on a wall or on a grave-stone, and there deposit their grubs.

    The History of Animals 2002

  • The coleoptera are, without exception, devoid of stings; the diptera have the sting in front, as the fly, the horsefly, the gadfly, and the gnat.

    The History of Animals 2002

  • All insects that slough at all slough in the same way; as the silphe, and the empis or midge, and all the coleoptera, as for instance the cantharus-beetle.

    The History of Animals 2002

  • There are several species of coleoptera that have lost the power of flight, for one reason or another.

    My Family and Other Animals Durrell, Gerald, 1925- 1956

Comments

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  • "'I have rarely seen a man so happy as my friend Martin: the coleoptera alone would have been worth the voyage, in his opinion, but as well as making a collection of very curious beetles he has also seen a boa...'"

    --Patrick O'Brian, The Far Side of the World, 190

    February 21, 2008