English

Pronunciation

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

Noun

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, David I. Shapiro-Ilan), 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:

     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.

Translations

Etymology 2

From in- +‎ star.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ɪnˈstɑː/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ɪnˈstɑɹ/

Verb

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, in 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, edition 14, 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

• sartin, strain, trains

French

Etymology

From Latin īnstar ‎(“of the same weight”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɛ̃.staʁ/
• Hyphenation: in‧star

Particle

instar

1. Only used in à l'instar de

Latin

Etymology

Of obscure origin.

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈiːn.star/

Noun

īnstar n ‎(indeclinable)

1. image, likeness, resemblance
2. counterpart
3. worth, value
4. an equal form (of)

Declension

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

References

• 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
• Félix Gaffiot (1934), “instar”, in Dictionnaire Illustré Latin-Français, Paris: Hachette.

Spanish

Etymology

From Latin īnstō ‎(“urge, insist”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ins.ˈtaɾ/

Verb

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

1. (transitive) to urge, to be urgent

Conjugation

Related terms

• instancia