1615–25, < Portuguese moréia < Latin mūraena < Greek mȳ́raina lamprey
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
After weeks of patience, last year's winner, Shane Gross, captured peppered moray eels scavenging for carrion at low tide.
From BBC ● Oct. 14, 2025
California moray eels live in coral reefs from Point Conception in Santa Barbara County to southern Baja California in Mexico, according to the Monterey Bay Aquarium.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 17, 2024
John Pogonoski, an ichthyologist in Australia, wasn’t about to be fooled by any moray eels.
From New York Times ● Sep. 14, 2023
Scientists exploring underwater caves have discovered a new species of moray eel that appears to be adapting to its unique habitat—by losing its eyes.
From Science Magazine ● May 18, 2023
Some time later, I made an informed guess that it had been a large moray eel.
From "The Cay" by Theodore Taylor
To cope with the funding shortfalls, every local authority in Scotland has increased council tax - ranging from 4% in Edinburgh to 10% in Aberdeenshire and Moray.
From BBC ● Jun. 11, 2026
Moray representative Laura Mitchell was among those to use a prop during the ceremony.
From BBC ● May 14, 2026
Holland and Matt Damon were also spotted in Burghead in Moray from where they were taken by boat to nearby Culbin Sands for scenes.
From BBC ● May 1, 2026
The approved 10% rise in Moray and Aberdeenshire are expected to be the biggest in Scotland.
From BBC ● Feb. 26, 2026
Being the Memoirs of Captain Robert Moray, sometime an Officer in the Virginia Regiment, and afterwards of Amherst's Regiment. 12mo.
From The Beautiful White Devil by Boothby, Guy Newell
The researchers used baited traps to lure the morays to the surface of inland caves that connect to the ocean on Australia’s Christmas Island and the Philippines’s Panglao Island.
From Science Magazine ● May 18, 2023
We hope you can still manage a smile, even as our societal morays crumble.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 28, 2022
Lana Sinapayen, an artificial life researcher who grew up in the Caribbean island of Martinique, said local fishermen often caught morays by placing squids on the shore and waiting for the eels to arrive.
From New York Times ● Jun. 22, 2021
That, to me, is trying to impose contemporary morays onto history.
From Slate ● Apr. 21, 2020
“I wouldn’t like one of those chaps to get after me,” the man said, indicating two big green morays.
From Two Boys of the Battleship or For the Honor of Uncle Sam by Webster, Frank V.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
