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chimera |
Also found in: Dictionary/thesaurus, Medical, Wikipedia, Hutchinson | 0.08 sec. |
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Chimera: see Bellerophon Bellerophon (bəlĕr`əfŏn, –fən), in Greek mythology, son of Glaucus; originally called Hipponoüs. ..... Click the link for more information. and Typhon Typhon (tī`fŏn) or Typhoeus ..... Click the link for more information. . chimeraor chimaeraAny of the 28 species of ancient fishes constituting the subclass Holocephali (class Chondrichthyes), found in temperate to cold waters of all oceans. Like sharks and rays, chimeras have a skeleton of cartilage rather than bone, and the males possess external reproductive organs (claspers). They have a single external gill opening, covered by a flap as in the bony fishes, on each side of the body. Males have a supplemental clasping organ that is unique among fishes. Chimeras have large pectoral and pelvic fins and two dorsal fins, the first preceded by a sharp spine. They range in length from 24 to 80 in. (60 to 200 cm) and in colour from silvery to blackish. They inhabit rivers, estuaries, coastal waters, and open ocean to depths of 8,000 ft (2,500 m) or more. They eat small fishes and invertebrates. ChimeraIn Greek mythology, a fire-breathing female monster. Its foreparts resembled a lion, its middle a goat, and its hindquarters a dragon. It devastated the land around Caria and Lycia until it was killed by Bellerophon. The word is now often used to denote a fantasy or a figment of the imagination. chimera mythical creature: goat-lion-dragon; vomited flames. [Classical Myth.: LLEI, I: 325] See : Monsters
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In other days, to seek the sources of the Nile--fontes Nili quoerere--was regarded as a mad endeavor, a chimera that could not be realized. Unfortunately, a chimera bombinating in a vacuum is, nowadays, only too capable of producing secondary causes. Hence those strange monsters in lace and embroidery, in silks and brocades, with vast wigs and hoops; which, under the name of lords and ladies, strut the stage, to the great delight of attorneys and their clerks in the pit, and of the citizens and their apprentices in the galleries; and which are no more to be found in real life than the centaur, the chimera, or any other creature of mere fiction. |
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