medusa
noun
a saucer-shaped or dome-shaped, free-swimming jellyfish or hydra.
medusa
1 American
[muh-doo-suh, -zuh, -dyoo-]
/ məˈdu sə, -zə, -ˈdju- /
noun
Zoology.
-
medusas,
plural
-
medusae
plural
Medusa
2
American
[muh-doo-suh, -zuh, -dyoo-]
/ məˈdu sə, -zə, -ˈdju- /
noun
Classical Mythology.
-
Medusas
plural
medusa
1
British
/ mɪˈdjuːzə /
noun
Medusa
2
British
/ mɪˈdjuːzə /
noun
medusa
Scientific
/ mĭ-do̅o̅′sə /
-
medusas
plural
-
A cnidarian in its free-swimming stage. Medusas are bell-shaped, with tentacles hanging down around a central mouth. Jellyfish are medusas, while corals and sea anemones lack a medusa stage and exist only as polyps.
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Compare polyp
Medusa
Cultural
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of medusa1
1750–60; special use of Medusa, alluding to the Gorgon's snaky locks
Origin of Medusa2
< Latin < Greek Médousa, special use of médousa, feminine of médōn ruling
Vocabulary lists containing medusa
Marine Biology - Middle School
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Marine Biology - High School
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
A jellyfish begins its life cycle as an anemone-like creature on the sea floor before undergoing a metamorphosis and sprouting into a recognizable medusa — that Pacman ghost shape we're all familiar with.
From Salon ● Aug. 2, 2023
Scientists prefer the term jelly or medusa over jellyfish because the creatures are not fish.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 25, 2022
Dr. Griffith knew that her disease, like cancer, was not one disease but many, a medusa of waving tentacles.
From New York Times ● Apr. 27, 2021
A black floor-length gown with undulating straps could have been a poisonous medusa, with coral-red dye bleeding down its multi-layered skirt.
From Washington Times ● Jan. 20, 2020
Then they have taken the form of a medusa.
From "The Thing About Jellyfish" by Ali Benjamin
That role was cut short, however, by Prada's acquisition of the flashy luxury label famous for its Medusa logo, owned by Capri Holdings Limited.
From Barron's ● Sep. 16, 2026
In the first “Furious” episode, she explains how Medusa, the snake-haired demon who turns men to stone, got that way.
From Salon ● Sep. 3, 2026
Its bronze door bears a Medusa head, her open mouth turned into a letter slot.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 30, 2026
Looking at Medusa, the hideous woman with snakes for hair, might turn the viewer to stone, but there’s power in offending the eye—or at least rejecting the pressure to be decorative.
From Slate ● Oct. 28, 2024
Percy slept like a Medusa victim—which is to say, like a rock.
From "The Son of Neptune" by Rick Riordan
Wearing a toadstool headdress and a skirt embellished with Medusas, El Beh has one of the most striking looks — though the orange ram’s horns on Trebien Pollard are quite something, too.
From New York Times ● Jan. 23, 2022
Medusas are the successors of Bruitparif’s first-generation sensors, called Sonopodes, which rely on expensive components imported from Japan.
From The New Yorker ● May 6, 2019
The band's final two songs are I Am The King and Medusas "which sounds like it's a Greek myth but is actually about jelly fish".
From BBC ● Feb. 28, 2019
He wielded his clinical obligation like Perseus’s shield, in which a cavalcade of Medusas lost their stony power.
From The Guardian ● Sep. 4, 2015
I followed the hissing and spitting sounds of Medusas hair.
From "The Lightning Thief" by Rick Riordan
“I was able to actually collect some of those medusae last year during the bloom, but rearing gelatinous organisms is pretty difficult,” Stajner said.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 3, 2024
Before they adhere to the ocean’s surface, they live underwater as tiny creatures known as medusae, Wagner said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 29, 2024
Although beached by-the-wind sailors die in great numbers, they most probably have already reproduced and left thousands of medusae in the sea, according to Wagner.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 29, 2024
It may give a better conception of the amount of medusae in this extent, if we calculate the length of time that would be requisite, with a certain number of persons, for counting this number.
From The Ocean and its Wonders by R. M. (Robert Michael) Ballantyne
The number of medusae in the olive-green water was found to be immense.
From The Ocean and its Wonders by R. M. (Robert Michael) Ballantyne
The blue seafaring colonies are themselves asexual, though they bud off tiny transparent medusas that are thought to go to the deep sea and reproduce sexually there, Stajner said.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 3, 2024
Vivid hues that evoked the sea beds and headwear that resembled medusas continued the theme.
From Seattle Times ● Mar. 1, 2022
But not all marine lakes have medusas, the bell-shape organisms you probably think of when the word "jellyfish" comes to mind.
From National Geographic ● Feb. 28, 2018
There is menace, too, in the sea, which is teeming with nasty stinging jellyfish known as medusas.
From New York Times ● Jul. 10, 2016
Huge medusas, exquisitely tinted, floated on the water like spread parasols.
From An Antarctic Mystery by Frances Cashel Hoey
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.
