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spider monkey

spider monkey

4 4.2
An animal that lives in trees in the Americas with long thin arms and a tail that grasps branches
  • noun
  • /ˈspaɪdər ˈmʌŋki/
translation icon : mono araña
  • So several years ago (when we were in high school on a class trip), I bought him a weird spider monkey.
  • woolly spider monkeys

I'll combine creatures like a spider monkey or a slizard.

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Examples

  • The spider monkey's thumbs are absent or reduced to a tiny tubercle.

  • The forest covering much of Barro Colorado Island in Gatun Lake, part of the Panama Canal, is home to four species of primates, among them howler and spider monkeys.

    Academic text (2004)
  • >> The spider monkey is as big as my hand.

  • Bridwell gave her a spider monkey.

  • Huxley himself studied the brain of the South American spider monkey, a "lower" primate on the traditional scale.

    Academic text (1995)
  • These species range from spider monkeys in Colombia, Venezuela, and Ecuador to two red colobus monkeys and a gorilla from Africa to five unusual species from Vietnam.

    Blog text (3)
  • The area is part of "the Maya Forest,... one of the few places on earth where visitors can look up from a stone city ten centuries old to watch spider monkeys turning somersaults through a tropical forest canopy" (Nations, Primack, and Bray 1998, xv).

    Academic text (2002)
  • In the tree above him, a family of spider monkeys has gathered to see about the commotion.

  • The surrounding jungle remains relatively undisturbed and is filled with the sounds of spider monkeys, parrots, toucans, and other exotic creatures.

  • The spider monkey's thumbs are absent or reduced to a tiny tubercle.

Synonyms

genus Ateles
vsspider monkey
  • Specialized
9.4

A group of Central and South American monkeys called spider monkeys with long arms and a tail that holds things

is the common descriptive name used for these arboreal New World monkeys

How Big

spider monkey
4 4.2
capuchin
4 8.2
saki
  • US
9.9
tamarin
1 8.6
marmoset
5 7.8

Surface Forms

spider monkey singular

Morphology

spider + monkey

The compound is compositional: 'spider' functions as a modifier describing a kind of 'monkey' with spider-like limbs or movement, so the referent (a monkey with long, slender limbs and a prehensile tail) can be inferred from the parts. This follows a common noun+noun compounding pattern found across languages and is not idiomatic, so a B1 learner who knows both words will very likely understand the meaning.

Etymology

Spider monkey may come from the animal's very long, thin arms and long tail, which make it look like a spider moving across the tree branches. That's why the name means 'a tree-living monkey' that swings and even hangs by its tail.