what is a colloquial way to call a "millepede" for children?

Question

Hi I am not a native speaker. I wold like to know how to say "millepede" in a colloquial way, like when you teach a child. Isn't millepede a formal name? thx

Answer 1

Do you mean the big, crawling bug with lot of legs and eats plants? We commonly call them millipedes. It can be spelled either this way (with an "i") or your way (with an "e"). They can't be called a bug with a million legs or feet because that would not be accurate. Millipedes (Class Diplopoda, previously also known as Chilognatha--both, more formal names) are very elongated arthropods with cylindrical bodies that have two pairs of legs for each one of their 20 to 100 or more body segments (except for the first segment behind the head which does not have any appendages at all, and the next few which only have one pair of legs). Each segment that has two pairs of legs is a result of two single segments fused together as one. They feed largely on vegetable matter and have no poisonous fangs. This class contains around 10,000 species.

Answer 2

Unfortunately, I can't think of any colloquial or children's term for a millepede in English the same way you have for other things in nature like "birdie" for bird, "snakey" for snake and "rhodie" for rhododendron, which some children pronounce as "wodie."

There is somewhat of a colloquial term for centipede in English "hundred footer" which is occasionally used in some places. I noticed that a web site from New Zealand ("Wild Land 2006") had a sentence in it which read "The house was invaded by a hundered footer this morning." But I can't think of anything similar for millipede.

As a person who has studied many, many languages I can tell you that centipede and millepede are usually not the kind of words that have any diminuatives or colloquial froms in languages. In fact, Latin had no real word for centipede at all. Late Latin had "scolopendra" from Greek, a type of Mediterranean centipede, while the English word "centipede" actually comes from Old French even though it's coined on the Latin words centum (hundred) and pedes (feet). The centipede was also called a "woodlouse" in some English dialects for a long time along with the sow bug, a crustacean.

The very nearest colloquial terms in English for a millepede might be "bug" and "creepy-crawler." But nothing more specific that I know of.

Marilyn B Re: "I'm puzzled as to why I have already been given a "thumbs down". Is there another meaning for the word?"

I'm sorry to see that! --- Brennus