pupa

Etymology

It is borrowed from New Latin pupa (“chrysalis”), a scientific term of Linnaeus (1758),^[2][3][4] who transferred Latin pūpa (“girl, doll, puppet”), also puppa, to the insect.^[2][3][5] The OED thinks the transfer was probably modelled on nympha and its source Ancient Greek νύμφη (númphē).^[2] Etymonline and Ayto explain it by the notion of an undeveloped creature.^[3][6] Klein takes the Latin noun as the feminine of pūpus (“boy, child”), related to puer (“boy, child”),^[7] and Etymonline traces the group, probably, to Proto-Indo-European *pau- (“few, little”);^[3] the OED instead suggests the same Indo-European base as Latvian pups (“teat, nipple, mother's breast”) and paupt (“to swell”).^[2] Words for "doll" were put to the same use in Dutch pop (from 1687), German Puppe (from 1720 or earlier), Swedish puppa (from 1740) and Italian pupa (from before 1799).^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

A stage in the life of an insect, between larva and adult: 1770, on 7 July in White's journals.^[2] Merriam-Webster Unabridged also has 1770;^[8] Barnhart and Etymonline date the word to 1773,^[9][3] Dictionary.com to 1765–70,^[10] and Hoad and Ayto to the 19th century.^[5][6]

Semantic evolution

Its use spread from insects to a transitional stage of some marine invertebrates, such as copepods, cirripedes and holothurians, in 1875.^[2][11] From 1838 Pupa was also the name of a genus of land snails, later renamed Pupilla, whose shells look like an insect's pupa.^[2] The Shorter Oxford notes that its older use for any pre-adult resting form of an insect is now rare.^[11] English formed the adjective pupal, recorded in 1866 in Darwin's Origin of Species, and the verb pupate in 1879, with pupation following in 1892.^[9]

Timeline

• 1770 – the stage between larva and adult in an insect's life.^[2][8]
• 1838 – Pupa, a genus of land snails.^[2]
• 1866 – the adjective pupal.^[9]
• 1875 – a transitional stage of some marine invertebrates.^[2]
• 1879 – the verb pupate.^[9]
• 1892 – the noun pupation.^[9]

Meanings

Noun

1. An insect at the usually motionless, non-feeding stage between larva and adult, often enclosed in a hard case or cocoon; a chrysalis.^[12][8][11]
2. That stage of an insect's life cycle, in which the larval structures are replaced by adult ones.^[8][2]
3. (zoology) A comparable transitional stage in some marine invertebrates.^[2][11]

Word family

• pupal
• prepupa

Related words

• puparium
• pupate
• pupil
• puppet
• puppy
• poppet
• puerile

Usage notes

The plural is pupae or pupas.^[12][8]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
5. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
7. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
9. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
10. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
11. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins