1538: lemur Feb 28, 2019

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European colonial powers at the time encountered many unique places, peoples, and animals, all of which needed a name. Some of these animals bore native names, others were named from relation to other things, but others were names more descriptively. With the lemur for instance, found only in Madagascar, the name comes from the Latin 'lemures' meaning ‘spirits of the dead’, due to the association made with its apparently specter-like facial features.
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