Plants & CreaturesGreek → English
Copepod
/ˈkoʊpɪpɒd/noun
A tiny crustacean, mostly planktonic, that swims with paddle-like legs.
The Greek roots
κώπη
kṓpē
oar, handle
πούς
poús
foot
Literally: “oar-footed”
The story of the word
κώπη is the oar of a trireme, and the name catches exactly what the animal does: flat legs beating in strokes. Copepods are often described as the most numerous multicellular animals on the planet, the grazing herd of the open ocean and the food supply beneath most fisheries. Their frozen dead carry carbon to the seabed in quantities that matter to the climate.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → New Latin → English
- First recorded
- 19th century
Same family
decapodisopodamphipodpodiumantipodes
In a sentence
A single tow net brought up thousands of copepods, all twitching.