instar

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English

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Etymology 1

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An instar of the mayfly Cloeon dipterum

From Latin instar (form, likeness), which is of obscure origin.

Pronunciation

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  • (UK) IPA(key): /ˈɪnstɑː/
  • (US) IPA(key): /ˈɪnstɑɹ/
  • Hyphenation: in‧star
  • Audio (US):(file)

Noun

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instar (plural instars)

  1. Any one of the several stages of postembryonic development which an arthropod undergoes, between molts, before it reaches sexual maturity.
  2. An arthropod at a specified one of these stages of development.
    • 2005, Nematodes as biocontrol agents, edited by Parwinder S. Grewal, Ralf-Udo Ehlers, and David I. Shapiro-Ilan, (Please provide the book title or journal name), page 133:
      In A. orientalis, first and second instars were more susceptible than third instars to H. bacteriophora TF strain, []
  3. (by extension) A stage in development.
    • 1955, Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: G[eorge] P[almer] Putnam’s Sons, published August 1958, →OCLC, part 2, page 148:
      We avoided Tourist Homes, country cousins of Funeral ones, old-fashioned, genteel and showerless, with elaborate dressing tables in depressingly white-and-pink little bedrooms, and photographs of the landlady’s children in all their instars.
    • 2014 January 8, Caleb Crain, “The Democratic Personality”, in The New Yorker[2]:
      California spirituality is a late instar of America’s utopian impulse, and corporate meritocracy derives from the Whig dream of the self-made man that entranced young Abraham Lincoln.
Translations
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Etymology 2

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From in- +‎ star.

Pronunciation

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Verb

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instar (third-person singular simple present instars, present participle instarring, simple past and past participle instarred)

  1. (transitive, archaic) To stud or adorn with stars or other brilliants; to star.
    • 1882, Frederick Randolph Abbe, The Temple Rebuilt: A Poem, page 125:
      Yet mark with shining steps the humbler way;
      And, as angelic feet instar the sky,
      Drop the bright sparks along the wilderness.
    • 1893, The Atlantic Monthly, volume 72, page 507:
      Espey could distinguish through the clear darkness the fringed branches of a pine-tree clinging to the heights above and waving against the instarred sky, and below a vague moving whiteness []
    • 1896, Mary Noailles Murfree (pseudonym Charles Egbert Craddock), In the Tennessee mountains, 14th edition, page 209:
      He was dreaming, surely; or were those deep, instarred eyes really fixed upon him with that wistful gaze which he had seen only twice before?
  2. (transitive) To make a star of; set as a star.

Anagrams

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French

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Etymology

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Borrowed from Latin īnstar (equivalent).

Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): /ɛ̃s.taʁ/
  • Audio:(file)
  • Hyphenation: in‧star

Noun

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instar

  1. Only used in à l’instar de (just like)

Derived terms

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Further reading

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Latin

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Etymology

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Of obscure origin.[1][2] Perhaps from a metaphor meaning 'to stand close to', thereby semantically related to Ancient Greek ἔχθαρ (ékhthar).[3]

This etymology is incomplete. You can help Wiktionary by elaborating on the origins of this term.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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īnstar n sg (indeclinable, no genitive)

  1. image, likeness, resemblance
  2. counterpart
  3. worth, value
  4. an equal form (of)
  5. of equal weight/size/form (to)
    • 1539 CE, Olaus Magnus, Carta Marina, marginal note.
      Quia, optime lector, Scandiana insula apud Plinium alter orbis terrarum, et a Iordane Gotho ac Paulo Diacono vagina sive officina gentium appellatur, plurimique populi (ut omnis scriptorum turba testatur) ex ea instar apum vel inundantium aquarum exiere, utile putavi nomina aliquarum gentium inde egressarum subiecta pagina indicare.
      Since, dear reader, the isle of Scandinavia is called another world in Pliny's works, and since it is called by Jordanes the Goth and Paul the Deacon a womb or manufacturing-room of ethnic groups, and since numerous peoples (as any group of scholars can attest) descended from there like a swarm of bees or floodwaters, I thought it useful to indicate, on the page below, the names of various ethnic groups that originated there.

Declension

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Not declined; used only in the nominative and accusative singular, singular only.

Case Singular
Nominative īnstar
Genitive
Dative
Accusative īnstar
Ablative
Vocative

Descendants

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  • English: instar
  • French: instar

References

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  • instar”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  • instar”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
  • instar in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
  1. ^ Eduard Wölfflin, Archiv für Lateinische Lexikographie und Grammatik mit Einschluß des älteren Mittellateins, Band 2, pp. 581-597, [1]
  2. ^ Menge, Burkard, et al., Lehrbuch der lateinischen Syntax und Semantik, p. 13.
  3. ^ Puhvel, ‘Greek Ἔχϑαρ and Latin Instar’.

Portuguese

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Pronunciation

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  • Hyphenation: ins‧tar

Etymology 1

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Borrowed from Latin īnstāre.

Verb

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instar (first-person singular present insto, first-person singular preterite instei, past participle instado) (intransitive)

  1. to urge [with com ‘someone’]
  2. to insist [with por ‘on’], to ask insistently for
  3. to question insistently, to interrogate [with a ‘someone’]
  4. to be imminent, to lurk
  5. to be urgent or necessary
Conjugation
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Etymology 2

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Borrowed from Latin instar.

Alternative forms

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Noun

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instar m (plural instares)

  1. (zoology) instar (Each of the states of metamorphosis of an invertebrate animal, comprised between two periods of molting.)

References

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Spanish

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Etymology

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From Latin īnstāre (urge, insist) whence English instant.

Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): /insˈtaɾ/ [ĩnsˈt̪aɾ]
  • Rhymes: -aɾ
  • Syllabification: ins‧tar

Verb

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instar (first-person singular present insto, first-person singular preterite insté, past participle instado)

  1. (intransitive) to urge (press someone to do something soon)
    Synonyms: urgir, apretar
  2. (transitive) to insist (repeat a plea)
    Synonym: insistir

Conjugation

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Further reading

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