Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- Having the females of two different kinds, one sexual, the other abortive or neuter, as the ants; specifically, pertaining to or having the characters of the Heterogyna.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective (Zoöl.) Having females very unlike the males in form and structure; -- as certain insects, the males of which are winged, and the females wingless.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective zoology Having
females very unlike themales in form and structure.
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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"Hard to pull a man's name to pieces before his face – ha, ha! but I am – a – not one thing myself – a kind of heterogynous – I am a piece of a physician, and a little in the agricultural line also; so it's all fair."
Queechy 1854
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"Hard to pull a man's name to pieces before his face ha, ha! but I am a not one thing myself a kind of heterogynous
Queechy, Volume I Susan Warner 1852
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External differences apparently so small, and which might elsewhere be deemed inadequate to the establishment of genera, become important in this remarkable family, from their being confirmed by the structure of the trophi, and the strong distinctions exhibited in their females in every instance that has yet presented itself to me, wherever I have had the certainty of specific identity in these heterogynous insects, from the direct observation of my friends in Australia.
Journals of Two Expeditions of Discovery in North-West and Western Australia, Volume 2 George Grey 1855
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