WORD FOR THE DAY: REMORA

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Your word for today is: remora, n.

remora, n.

[‘Any of various slender marine fishes of the family Echeneidae, which have the dorsal fin modified to form a large oval suction disc for attachment to the undersides of sharks, other large fishes, cetaceans, and turtles Also called sharksucker, suckerfish,suckingfish. Cf. echeneis n.’]

Pronunciation: Brit. /ˈrɛm(ə)rə/, /rᵻˈmɔːrə/,  U.S. /ˈrɛmərə/

Inflections:  Plural  remoras,  remora, (rare) remorae.

Etymology: <  classical Latin remora delay, hindrance, in post-classical Latin also denoting the fish called ἐχενηΐς by the Greeks (4th cent.; 1535, 1620 in British sources; <  re- re- prefix + mora delay: see mora n.¹), apparently so called from the former belief that the fish hindered the progress of ships (see note at sense 1a). Compare Middle French, French rémora, †rémore kind of fish (1562), delay, hindrance (c1610), Spanish rémora kind of fish (16th cent.), Portuguese rêmora kind of fish (1624), Italian remora kind of fish (1476), delay, hindrance (a1574). Compare earlier echeneis n.

Classical Latin remora denoting the fish also occurs in older editions of Pliny Nat. Hist. 32. 1 (compare quot. 1601 at sense 1a), where modern editions read mora.
N.E.D. (1906) gives the pronunciation as (re·mŏră) /ˈrɛmərə/.

 1.

 a.  Any of various slender marine fishes of the family Echeneidae, which have the dorsal fin modified to form a large oval suction disc for attachment to the undersides of sharks, other large fishes, cetaceans, and turtles. Also called sharksucker,suckerfish, suckingfish. Cf. echeneis n.

Remoras act as cleaners on their hosts and also feed on leftover food fragments. They were formerly believed to hinder the progress of sailing ships to which they attached themselves.

1533  T. Elyot Of Knowl. Wise Man iii. f. 47^v, An other fysshe called Remora, all though he be very lytell in body, yet wyll he staye and reteyne a greatte shyppe beinge vnder saylle.

1567  J. Maplet Greene Forest f. 84, The fish Echeneis or Remora, staiship, amazeth also..the beholder by his hid and occult..vertue.

1591  Spenser Visions of Worlds Vanitie in Complaints ix, There clove unto her keele A little fish, that men call Remora, Which stopt her course.

1601  P. Holland tr. Pliny Hist. World II. 426 The said stay-ship Echeneis or Remora (call it whether you will).

1640  in Harl. Misc. (Malh.) IV. 301 With much more likelihood than that the remora stays vessels under full sail.

1667 Second Advice to Painter 10 Smith (to the Duke) doth intercept her way, And cleaves to her closer then the Remora.

1712 Philos. Trans. 1710–12 (Royal Soc.) 27 348 Fig. 12 is a rare sort of Remora, or Stop-Ship, with a very taper Body.

1796  J. G. Stedman Narr. Exped. Surinam II. xxx. 385 The remora, or sucking-fish, is frequently found sticking to sharks, and to ships bottoms.

1826  W. S. Landor Imaginary Conversat. (ed. 2) II. xviii. 590 Like the remora, of which mariners tell marvels, it counteracts, as it were, both oar and sail.

1876 Beneden's Anim. Parasites Introd. 18 The fish which, through idleness, attaches itself, like the remora, to a neighbour who swims well.

1909 Chatterbox 187/1 This fish is the remora, or sucking-fish.

1931  E. G. Boulenger Fishes xvi. 144 Tethered Remoras are sometimes employed to catch Turtles, to which they readily adhere.

1959 Sci. News Let. 10 Jan. 24/1 The remora, or disk fish..attach themselves to other marine animals by suction cup-like disks.

1997  G. S. Helfman et al.  Diversity of Fishes xv. 254/1 The echeneid remoras or sharksuckers are a highly specialized group of percomorphs.

 b.  fig. and in figurative contexts. Cf. also sense 2a.

?1575  J. Hooker Orders Enacted for Orphans Ep. f. 13^v, Remoræ at the land, which sticking & cleuing to the ship of the common welth, doo what they can to stop and hinder the due course of good gouernment.

1605  Bacon Of Aduancem. Learning ii. sig. Hh1^v, They are indeed but Remoraes and hinderances to stay and slugge the Shippe from furder sayling.

a1631  J. Donne Serm. (1956) VIII. 139 This was a Rock in his Sea, and a Remora upon his Ship.

1643  A. Tuckney Balme of Gilead 29 What unhappy remora or Anchor under water not yet seen, hath stopt us in this happy course?

c1710 Advice to True Representatives Old Eng. (single sheet), Ye Steers-men of State, take care of our Fate; Remove all the Remoras e're it's too late.

1743  A. Hill Fanciad v. 44 These Remoras, close-cleaving, deep, Hang on War's Motions, and retard her Sweep.

1812  J. Marsden Leisure Hours 67 Think the little fell remora Impious as a son of Corah.

1850  C. Kingsley Alton Locke II. xv. 216 And I was a remora, weak and helpless, till I could attach myself to some living thing; and then I had power to stop the largest ship.

1911  E. Underhill Mysticism (1912) ii. 37 Cast off, as the mystics are always begging you to do, the fetters of the senses, the ‘remora of desire’.

1969 College Eng. 31 149/1 Similar arguments against fastening it as a sort of remora to a general education course.

1992 Time 6 July 65/3 Instead of a museum, he designed a mammoth sculpture, a space where the paintings would always be subordinate, the Kandinskys and Mirós little remoras stuck to the skin of his great whale.

 c.  Heraldry. A representation of a remora, usually resembling an entwined serpent.

1612  H. Peacham Gentlemans Exercise iii. 163 Of fishes you shall find in Armes the Whale, the Dolphin, the Salmon, the Trout, Barbel, Turbot, Herring, Roach, Remora Escallop shels.

1780  J. Edmondson Compl. Body Heraldry II. (Gloss.), s.v., The figure of Prudence, which is represented as holding in her hand a javelin entwined with a serpent proper, such serpent is expressed by the word Remora.

1842  T. Moule Heraldry of Fish 203 The arms bearing the remora, alluded to by Peacham, are not known; but as an emblem of prudence this fish is used in heraldry

1906  J. Vinycomb Fictional & Symb. Creatures in Art (2004) 122 Remora is an old term in heraldry for a serpent entwining.

1930 Isis 13 348 An expert on such matters, has..looked up additional authorities but nowhere finds any reference to the use of the remora in heraldry other than these isolated ones.

 2.

 a.  An obstacle, an impediment, a hindrance. Now rare.

1604  C. Edmondes Observ. Cæsars Comm. II. vii. xxv. 100 That authoritie..was as a Remora to diuers other nations of Gallia, from shewing that defection by plaine and open reuolt.

1672  W. de Britaine Dutch Usurp. 19 There is no such Remora to Grandeur, as a coy and squemish Conscience.

1740  Lady M. W. Montagu Let. 4 June (1966) II. 193 My stay here..shall be as short as these remoras will permit.

1793  W. Cowper Let. 17 July (1984) IV. 370 These numerous demands are likely to operate as a remora, and to keep us fixt at home.

1820  C. Colton Lacon I. cxli. 80 The great remora to any improvement in our civil code.

1864  J. H. Newman Apologia 407 A sort of remora or break in the development of doctrine.

2000  W. Mignolo Local Hist. Global Designs i. 50 What coexists is the colonial remora of Bolivian history, the different articulations of colonizing forces and colonized victims.

 b.  Med. Obstruction, reduction, or cessation of flow, esp. of blood; stasis or stagnation of blood or other fluid; an instance of this. Now disused.

1684  S. Pordage tr T. Willis Pract. Physick ix. ii. 57 For sometimes the blood irritated into a Feaver causes an obstruction of the Lungs; and the blood also sometimes finding a remora in the Lungs, receives a feaverish boiling from its proper obstruction.

1722  D. Turner Art of Surg. I. 253 By some Remora or Stop given to the Fluid therein moving.

1765  tr. G van Swieten Comm. Aphorisms Boerhaave (ed. 2) III. 340 He places the cause of it in the remora or stagnation which the blood suffers in the vessels.

1782  A. Monro Compar. Anat. (ed. 3) 9 Too long a remora of the juices might occasion the worst consequences.

1790  J. Andree Considerations Bilious Dis. (ed. 2) 54 Jaundice may be more rationally deduced from a viscidity of the bile itself, flowing too slowly through it's natural ducts, and in consequence of this remora, admitting of some absorption of bile into the blood.

1829 London Med. Gaz 7 Mar. 454/2 The uterus presses on the iliac veins, and causes a remora, or stagnation of blood.

1898 Lancet 5 Nov. 1178/2 When there is a tendency to venous remora, the heart is apt to participate in the general stagnation.

1905  E. T. Blake Intestinal Catarrhs (ed. 2) 102 Large and tortuous veins are to be seen, with capillaries dilated by the backward stress of general venous remora, due to contracted arteries.

†3.  Surg. An instrument or device for holding or stabilizing a part of the body during an operation; esp. a device with a fixed central pin used in the reduction of dislocations. Obs. rare.

1674  G. Fabrice Cista Militaris 27, I have always found in my practice the Instrument of Ambrose Parey, which is with a Pulley, the most convenient; especially if you joyn to it the Girdle and Remora.

1688  R. Holme Acad. Armory iii. xii. 434/2 A Remora, which is an Instrument used for the helping of a dislocated Shoulder.

1840 Trans. Provinc. Med. & Surg. Assoc. 8 216 Fixing the upper part of the body by what he [sc. Hildanus] calls a remora, he simply applied a vinculum with cords and weights attached.

1870  W. Fergusson Syst. Pract. Surg. (ed. 5) 333, I have seen an upright pin, like the remora of Hildanus,..placed in a stout intended to be used for such purposes.

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