Word.ws English Dictionary

embryophagy

embryophagy noun: the act of one embryo cannibalizing another for food in utero; at present only observed in some species of sharks.

Noun

embryophagy (uncountable)

  1. The act of one embryo cannibalizing another for food in utero; at present only observed in some species of sharks.

Synonyms of embryophagy

Origin of embryophagy

From Latin embryo and the suffix -phagy (“to feed on”); 1948; created to describe the behavior of sandtiger shark embryos.

Questions about embryophagy

What does embryophagy mean?
Embryophagy means the act of one embryo cannibalizing another for food in utero; at present only observed in some species of sharks.
What part of speech is embryophagy?
Embryophagy is a noun.

Words near embryophagy in the dictionary

  1. embryopathies
  2. embryopathological
  3. embryopathology
  4. embryopathy
  5. embryophagous
  6. embryophagy
  7. embryophore
  8. embryophores
  9. embryophyte
  10. embryophytes
  11. embryophytic

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: embryophagy (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “embryophagy.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/embryophagy. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.