temnospondyl
temnospondyl noun: any of many extinct primitive amphibians (labyrinthodonts) of the order Temnospondyli, from the Carboniferous, Permian and Triassic periods.
Noun
temnospondyl (plural temnospondyls)
- Any of many extinct primitive amphibians (labyrinthodonts) of the order Temnospondyli, from the Carboniferous, Permian and Triassic periods.
- Experts disagree over whether temnospondyls were ancestral to modern amphibians (frogs, salamanders and caecilians), or whether the whole group died out without leaving descendants.
- Nigerpeton is a temnospondyl, more closely related to modern amphibians than to amniotes, but far bigger than today's diminutive amphibians.2022, Thomas Halliday, Otherlands, Penguin, published 2023, page 178
Forms of temnospondyl
| plural | temnospondyls |
|---|
Origin of temnospondyl
From translingual Temnospondyli, from Ancient Greek τέμνω (témnō, “I cut”) + σπόνδυλος (spóndulos), Ionic/Attic form of σφόνδυλος (sphóndulos, “vertebra”).
Questions about temnospondyl
- What does temnospondyl mean?
- Temnospondyl means any of many extinct primitive amphibians (labyrinthodonts) of the order Temnospondyli, from the Carboniferous, Permian and Triassic periods.
- What part of speech is temnospondyl?
- Temnospondyl is a noun.
- What is the plural of temnospondyl?
- The plural of temnospondyl is temnospondyls.
Words near temnospondyl in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: temnospondyl (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: “temnospondyl.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/temnospondyl. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.