A genus of freshwater turtles in the family Emydidae, including the pond turtle; also the ancient Greek word for turtle.
From Greek emys meaning 'turtle,' used directly as a scientific genus name by Linnaeus. The word's origin in ancient Greek shows the long history of observing these animals.
When Carl Linnaeus created modern scientific naming, he chose Emys as the genus name by simply Latinizing the ancient Greek word for turtle—so biologists have been calling these turtles 'emys' for over 250 years, preserving a word that's thousands of years old!
Complete word intelligence in one call. Free tier — 50 lookups/day.