entry
elopomorpha
/ˌɛləpəˈmɔrfə/Superorder of fishes with leptocephalus larvae
From Greek elop- (Elops).
Word Ancestry
The name begins with a fish name that sounds almost like a spell from a fantasy novel: Greek ἔλωψ, élōps, a term for a fish later preserved in the genus Elops. Then zoologists attached μορφή, morphḗ, “form,” the same little Greek engine found in morphology, metamorphosis, and amorphous. In 1758, Linnaeus’s tenth-edition classification helped turn this Greek-and-Latin naming machinery into the filing system biologists still use today. So Elopomorpha literally suggests “the Elops-shaped ones,” although the group is united less by looking like a tarpon than by possessing an extraordinary transparent, ribbonlike larva called a leptocephalus. The memorable trick is to picture an Elops fish carrying a Greek label-maker: one label names the fish, the other announces its form, and together they identify a whole superorder.
The Story
The name begins with a fish name that sounds almost like a spell from a fantasy novel: Greek ἔλωψ, élōps, a term for a fish later preserved in the genus Elops. Then zoologists attached μορφή, morphḗ, “form,” the same little Greek engine found in morphology, metamorphosis, and amorphous. In 1758, Linnaeus’s tenth-edition classification helped turn this Greek-and-Latin naming machinery into the filing system biologists still use today. So Elopomorpha literally suggests “the Elops-shaped ones,” although the group is united less by looking like a tarpon than by possessing an extraordinary transparent, ribbonlike larva called a leptocephalus. The memorable trick is to picture an Elops fish carrying a Greek label-maker: one label names the fish, the other announces its form, and together they identify a whole superorder.
Kin & Kindred
From 'elop-'·Elops, a kind of fish
Derived Terms
English words from this root
From '-morpha'·form or shape
Derived Terms
English words from this root
Sources
Wikipedia