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Webster 1913 Edition
Belemnite
Be-lem′nite
,Noun.
[Gr.
[GREEK]
dart, fr. [GREEK]
dart, fr. [GREEK]
to throw: cf. F. bélemnite
.] (Paleon.)
A conical calcareous fossil, tapering to a point at the lower extremity, with a conical cavity at the other end, where it is ordinarily broken; but when perfect it contains a small chambered cone, called the phragmocone, prolonged, on one side, into a delicate concave blade; the thunderstone. It is the internal shell of a cephalopod related to the sepia, and belonging to an extinct family. The belemnites are found in rocks of the Jurassic and Cretaceous ages.
– Bel-em-nit′ic
, Adj.
Webster 1828 Edition
Belemnite
BELEM'NITE
,Noun.
Arrow-head, or finger stone; vulgarly called thunder-bolt, or thunder stone. A genus of fossil shells, common in chalk and limestone. These shells consist of an interior cone, divided into partitions connected by a syphon, as in the nautilus, and surrounded by a number of concentric layers, made up of fibers radiating from the axis. These layers are somewhat transparent, and when burnt, rubbed or scraped, give the odor of rasped horn. The species are now extinct.
Definition 2024
belemnite
belemnite
See also: bélemnite
English
Noun
belemnite (plural belemnites)
- (paleontology) An extinct order Belemnitida of Mesozoic marine cephalopod, very similar in many ways to the modern squid and closely related to the modern cuttlefish; a fossil of this creature
- 1895, H. G. Wells, The Time Machine, ch VIII
- In the universal decay this volatile substance had chanced to survive, perhaps through many thousands of centuries. It reminded me of a sepia painting I had once seen done from the ink of a fossil Belemnite that must have perished and become fossilized millions of years ago.
- 1895, H. G. Wells, The Time Machine, ch VIII