carapace
- a bony or chitinous shield, test, or shell covering some or all of the dorsal part of an animal, as of a turtle.
Origin of carapace
Related Words for carapace
fur, coating, crust, surface, jacket, husk, membrane, rind, bark, sheath, case, integument, scale, skeleton, chassis, hull, frame, shard, shuck, frameworkExamples from the Web for carapace
Contemporary Examples of carapace
I walked back to my desk, keeping the satisfaction locked tight within a carapace of steely unconcern, and took in the scene.
It encases their loserdom in a carapace of purity and righteousness.
Ian McEwan: Well, I think one way… I think you have to develop a carapace of boringness.
Greater awareness of that would soften their carapace of greed.
Historical Examples of carapace
The arthropods in general were provided with a carapace; most of them were crustaceans.
Creative EvolutionHenri Bergson
At least three segments of the trunk are left uncovered by the carapace.
The last four or five segments of the trunk are free from the carapace.
The Monosphrida comprise all those Sphroidea in which the carapace is represented only by one single lattice-shell.
In Chelonia the ribs are generally combined with the carapace.
The Vertebrate SkeletonSidney H. Reynolds
carapace
- the thick hard shield, made of chitin or bone, that covers part of the body of crabs, lobsters, tortoises, etc
Word Origin for carapace
Word Origin and History for carapace
1836, from French carapace "tortoise shell" (18c.), from Spanish carapacho or Portuguese carapaça, of uncertain origin, perhaps somehow from Latin capa (see cape (n.1)).
carapace
- A hard outer covering or shell made of bone or chitin on the back of animals such as turtles, armadillos, lobsters, and crabs.