woodworm

English

(Anobium punctatum larva

Grooves made in wood by woodworms

Wikispecies

Etymology

From wood +‎ worm.

Pronunciation

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Noun

woodworm (countable and uncountable, plural woodworms)

1. Any of many beetle larvae that bore into wood.
   • 1599, Simon Harward, “A Displaying of the wilfull deuises of wicked and vaine worldlings” in Three Sermons, London: Richard Johns,^[1]

     […] Chrisostome doth compaire enuie to the wood worm which though it doe breede in the tymber, yet it doth consume & waste the tymber, as enuie springing of the heart doth putrifie and vtterly eat vp the heart.

   • 1872, Robert Louis Stevenson, letter to Mrs. Thomas Stevenson dated July 29, 1872, in Sidney Colvin (editor), The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson, New York: Scribner, 1917, Volume I, p. 45,^[2]

     There was only one contretemps during the whole interview—the arrival of another visitor, in the shape (surely) the last of God’s creatures, a wood-worm of the most unnatural and hideous appearance, with one great striped horn stucking out of his nose like a boltsprit. If there are many wood-worms in Germany, I shall come home.

   • 1980, AA Book of British Villages, Drive Publications Ltd, page 144:

     New Alresford is constantly mispronounced, T-shaped, honeycombed with cellars, packed with antique shops, riddled with woodworm, surrounded by watercress. The name - which means 'ford by the alders' - is pronounced 'Allsford'; and no one ever uses 'New', though they do call the adjoining village Old Alresford.

   • 1992, Colm Tóibín, chapter 2, in The Heather Blazing, Penguin, published 1994, page 25:

     His father met a man who said that he had the figure from a ship which went aground near Blackwater Head. It would have to be treated for woodworm, he said.

   1. (particularly) Anobium punctatum (common furniture beetle).
2. A shipworm, a worm-like mollusk in the family Teredinidae that feeds on wood underwater in saltwater.

Synonyms

• (Anobium punctatum): furniture beetle

Hyponyms

• (any wood-boring beetle larvae): deathwatch beetle

Translations

larvae that bore into wood

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 蛀蟲 / 蛀虫 (zh) (zhùchóng), 木蛀蟲 / 木蛀虫

• Classical Nahuatl: cuauhocuilin
• Cornish: pryv prenn m
• Czech: červotoč (cs) m
• Dutch: houtworm (nl)
• Finnish: jumi (fi)
• Galician: couza f, broca f, trilla f, rela f
• German: Holzwurm (de) m
• Greek:

  Ancient: θρῑ́ψ m (thrī́ps)

• Italian: tarlo (it) m
• Latin: tarmes (la) m, terēdō f
• Old Czech: dřěvotoč m, črvotoč m
• Ottoman Turkish: آغاج قوردی (ağac kurdu)
• Russian: точи́льщик (ru) m (točílʹščik) (no specific word for larva)
• Sicilian: càmula (scn) f, cagnolu (scn) m (referred to larvae)
• Spanish: carcoma (es) f, polilla (es) f, quera f
• Turkish: ağaç kurdu (tr)
• Welsh: pryf pren m
• Yakut: мас үөнэ (mas üöne)

Anagrams

• Wormwood, wormwood