Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Of, relating to, or belonging to the Diptera, a large order of insects that includes the true flies and mosquitoes, characterized by a single pair of membranous wings and a pair of club-shaped balancing organs.
- adj. Having two wings, as certain insects, or winglike appendages, as certain fruits and seeds: the dipterous fruit of the maple.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- In entomology, having two wings; specifically, pertaining to or having the characters of the order Diptera (which see).
- 2. In botany, having two wing-like membranous appendages; bialate: applied to stems, fruits, seeds, etc.
Wiktionary
- adj. Of, or pertaining to, Diptera.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. (Zoöl.) Having two wings, as certain insects; belonging to the order Diptera.
- adj. (Bot.) Having two wings; two-winged.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. of or relating to or belonging to the Diptera
Etymologies
- From New Latin Diptera, order name, from Greek dipteros, having two wings : di-, two; see di-1 + pteron, wing; see -pter. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“For the very reason of their being dipterous is that they are small and weak, and therefore require no more than two feathers to support their light weight; and the same reason which reduces their feathers to two causes their sting to be in front; for their strength is not sufficient to allow them to strike efficiently with the hinder part of the body.”
“Of creatures that can fly and are bloodless some are coleopterous or sheath-winged, for they have their wings in a sheath or shard, like the cockchafer and the dung-beetle; others are sheathless, and of these latter some are dipterous and some tetrapterous: tetrapterous, such as are comparatively large or have their stings in the tail, dipterous, such as are comparatively small or have their stings in front.”
“Some insects are dipterous or double-winged, as the fly; others are tetrapterous or furnished with four wings, as the bee; and, by the way, no insect with only two wings has a sting in the rear.”
“Many species of dipterous insects - fruit fly, face fly, botfly, horn fly, and housefly, for example - are targets for neem products.”
“I wish I knew who was the author; you ought to know, as he admires you so much; he has a wonderful deal of knowledge, but his difficulties have not troubled me much as yet, except the case of the dipterous larva.”
“Extended notes on various dipterous larvæ infesting man.”
“Notice of a case in which the larvæ of a dipterous insect, supposed to be _Anthomyia canicularis_, Meig., were expelled in large quantities from the human intestines.”
“Jaw-capsule: contains the mouth structures in those dipterous larvae in which the head is differentiated.”
“Dipterocecidium: a gall formed by a dipterous insect.”
“Larvina: a maggot: a dipterous larva without distinct head or legs.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘dipterous’.
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Logolepsy
"Luciferous Logolepsy is a collection of over 9,000 obscure English words. Though the definition of an 'English' word might seem to be straightforward, it is not. There exist so many adopted, deriv...
Anschauung, Areopagus, Argus, Briarean, Dei gratia, Dei judicium, Deo volente, Duecento, Foehn, Geflugelte Worte, Gegenschein, Hakenkreuz and 9230 more...
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eesome
Includes any intangible conceivable independently of Hom. Sap.
depthless, overspire, unsteady, thitherward, rile, munchable, covet, pastinaceous, mirtle, slonk, tink, inerrarable and 345 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for dipterous.
yarb ...a dipterous insect projecting its proboscis over the dripstone...
- Louis Zukofsky, Thanks to the Dictionary Jun 20, 2008