Plants & CreaturesGreek → English
Anuran
/əˈnjʊərən/noun
A frog or toad, member of the amphibian order that loses its tail on reaching adult form.
The Greek roots
ἀν-
an-
without
οὐρά
ourá
tail
Literally: “tailless”
The story of the word
The order name is a description of what is missing. A tadpole does not drop its tail the way a lizard does; it dismantles it and recycles the material into the growing body, so nothing is left behind. The same οὐρά stands at the end of urodele, the tailed amphibians, and inside squirrel, from σκίουρος, shadow-tail.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Modern Latin → English
- First recorded
- 19th century
Same family
urodelesquirrelanonymousanaemia
In a sentence
Anurans account for nearly nine in ten living amphibian species.
The survey counted seven anuran species in one pond.