lemures

[ lem-yuh-reez; Latin lem-oo-res ]

plural nounRoman Religion.
  1. ghosts, especially those of a family’s dead, considered troublesome unless exorcised or appeased, as during the annual festival of Lemuralia.

Origin of lemures

1
First recorded in 1545–55; from Latin; see origin at lemur

Words Nearby lemures

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use lemures in a sentence

  • I had read of banshees, lemures and leprechauns; they were the ghosts and the fairies of ignorance but they were not like this.

    The Blind Spot | Austin Hall
  • Philosophy, never fit for the people, had entered the best houses, and the image of Epicurus had taken the place of the lemures.

    Imaginary Conversations and Poems | Walter Savage Landor
  • The ghosts, or specters of the dead that came back to haunt and terrify the living were called lemures.

  • Their hypothetical common ancestor, the Archipithecus, may have descended directly or indirectly from a branch of the lemures.

    The Last Link | Ernst Haeckel
  • Lemur, the name given to that low family of monkeys, is from the plural Latin word lemures, meaning ghost or spectre.

    The Log of the Sun | William Beebe

British Dictionary definitions for lemures

lemures

/ (ˈlɛmjʊˌriːz) /


pl n
  1. Roman myth the spirits of the dead

Origin of lemures

1
Latin: see lemur

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012