chrysalis

See also: Chrysalis

English

Alternative forms

chrysalid, chrysaloid (archaic)

Etymology

From Latin chrysalis, from Ancient Greek χρυσαλλίς (khrusallís), from χρυσός (khrusós, “gold”), because of the color of some of them.

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): /ˈkɹɪsəlɪs/, enPR: krĭʹsəlĭs
- Audio (Southern England) (file)

Noun

chrysalis (plural chrysalises or chrysalides)

The pupa of a butterfly or moth, enclosed inside a cocoon, in which metamorphosis takes place.
- 1929, M. Barnard Eldershaw, chapter VII, in A House is Built, viii:
  Fanny was afraid. She was like an insect new-hatched from its chrysalis, naked and unprotected in a dawn she could not face.
The cocoon itself.
(figuratively) A limiting environment or situation.
- 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter I, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., OCLC 222716698:
  However, with the dainty volume my quondam friend sprang into fame. At the same time he cast off the chrysalis of a commonplace existence.
- 2020 September 1, Douglas Rushkoff, “The Privileged Have Entered Their Escape Pods”, in OneZero‎:
  No, no matter how far Ray Kurzweil gets with his artificial intelligence project at Google, we cannot simply rise from the chrysalis of matter as pure consciousness.

Derived terms

chrysalid
chrysaline
chrysaloid

Translations

the pupa of a butterfly or moth

Arabic: please add this translation if you can
Armenian: հարսնյակ (hy) (harsnyak)
Asturian: crisálida f
Basque: please add this translation if you can
Belarusian: ку́калка f (kúkalka), ля́лечка f (ljálječka)
Bulgarian: какавида f (kakavida)
Catalan: crisàlide (ca) f
Chinese:
Mandarin: 蝶蛹 (zh) (diéyǒng), 蛹 (zh) (yǒng)
Czech: kukla (cs) f
Danish: please add this translation if you can
Dutch: pop (nl) f
Esperanto: please add this translation if you can
Estonian: nukk
Finnish: kotelo (fi)
French: chrysalide (fr) f
Galician: crisálide f, crisálida f
Georgian: ჭუპრი (č̣uṗri)
German: Puppe (de) f
Greek: χρυσαλλίδα (el) f (chrysallída)
Hebrew: please add this translation if you can
Hungarian: báb (hu)
Icelandic: púpa (is) f
Italian: crisalide (it)
Japanese: 蛹 (ja) (さなぎ, sanagi)
Kazakh: қуыршақ (quyrşaq)
Khmer: ដក់ដឿ (km) (dɑkdɨə)
Korean: 번데기 (beondegi)
Malay: kepompong
Maori: tūngoungou
Pitjantjatjara: impi
Polish: poczwarka (pl) f
Portuguese: crisálida f, crisálide f
Romanian: pupă (ro) f
Russian: ку́колка (ru) f (kúkolka), хризали́да f (xrizalída)
Scottish Gaelic: cochall m
Serbo-Croatian:
Roman: kukuljica (sh) f, lutka (sh) f
Slovak: kukla f
Slovene: buba (sl) f
Spanish: crisálida (es) f
Swedish: puppa (sv) c
Tagalog: tilas
Tamil: please add this translation if you can
Thai: ดักแด้ (th) (dàk-dɛ̂ɛ)
Turkish: please add this translation if you can
Ukrainian: ля́лечка f (ljálečka)
Vietnamese: nhộng (vi)
Volapük: krüsalid (vo)