Carapace
//ˈkæ.ɹəˌpeɪs// noun
noun ·Uncommon ·Advanced level
Definitions
Noun
- 1 A hard protective covering of bone or chitin, especially one which covers the dorsal portion of an animal.
- 2 hard outer covering or case of certain organisms such as arthropods and turtles wordnet
- 3 That which protects. figuratively
"So, little by little, youth loosens the hard carapace of confining custom their elders have built over the human heart."
Example
More examples"In the terrarium lived a millipede with a shiny carapace."
Etymology
Borrowed from French carapace (“tortoise shell”), from Spanish carapacho, of unknown origin, but likely from an extinct Ibero-Mediterranean substrate language. Compare Catalan carabassa, Ancient Greek κάραβος (kárabos, “beetle”), Latin scarabaeus (the source of scarab); also Spanish galápago (“kind of turtle”). Doublet of calipash.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.