Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun A Cuvierian genus of insectivorous quadrupeds, the desmans: later changed to Myogale or Myogalia.
- noun The leading genus formerly of the nowdisused family Mygalidæ.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- proper noun (Zoöl.) A genus of very large hairy spiders of the family
Ctenizidae , having four lungs and only four spinnerets. They do not spin webs, but usually construct tubes in the earth, which are often furnished with a trapdoor. The South American bird spider (Mygale avicularia ), and the crab spider, or matoutou (Mygale cancerides ) are among the largest species. They are also calledtrapdoor spiders . Some of the species are erroneously calledtarantulas , as the Texas tarantula (Mygale Hentzii ).
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun zoology Any of the former
genus Mygale of large,hairy trapdoor spiders with fourlungs and fourspinnerets , now distributed in Mygalomorphae
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Once we were digging yuca in a chacra when we came across a fine specimen of the mygale, which is indigenous to all the Amazon woods, but is rarely met with.
Head Hunters of the Amazon: Seven Years of Exploration and Adventure 1923
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Most insects and poisonous spiders: mygale spider, brown recluse.
Astrology for Enlightenment Michelle Karén 2008
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Although she had been told that the mygale sometimes ate small birds, her short experience in the Amazon had taught her that not many creatures - insects and piranha excepted - attacked unless hungry, provoked, trodden upon or surrounded by others of their species.
River Of Desire Taylor, Abra 1982
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At Quibe I saw a bird-catching spider (_mygale_), of extraordinary large size.
Travels in Peru, on the Coast, in the Sierra, Across the Cordilleras and the Andes, into the Primeval Forests Johann Jakob von Tschudi 1853
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We may see the mygale, or bird-catching spider, at the end of his strong net-trap, among the thick foliage; and the tarantula, at the bottom of his dark pit-fall, constructed in the ground.
Popular Adventure Tales Mayne Reid 1850
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We may see the mygale, or bird-catching spider, at the end of his strong net-trap, among the thick foliage; and the tarantula, at the bottom of his dark pitfall, constructed in the ground.
The Forest Exiles The Perils of a Peruvian Family in the Wilds of the Amazon Mayne Reid 1850
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The mygale carries its eggs enclosed in a cocoon of white silk of a very close tissue, formed of two round pieces uniting at their borders.
The Western World Picturesque Sketches of Nature and Natural History in North and South America William Henry Giles Kingston 1847
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For my own part, no instance came to my knowledge in Ceylon of a mygale attacking a bird; but PERCIVAL, who wrote his account of the island in
Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon James Emerson Tennent 1836
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In particular situations, where the entrance is exposed to the wind, the mygale, on the approach of the monsoon, extends the strong tissue above it so as to serve as an awning to prevent the access of rain.
Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon James Emerson Tennent 1836
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The accuracy of her statement has since been impugned [2] by a correspondent of the Zoological Society of London, on the ground that the mygale makes no net, but lives in recesses, to which no humming-bird would resort; and hence, the writer somewhat illogically declares, that he
Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon James Emerson Tennent 1836
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