From Latin 'larva' (ghost, mask) — Linnaeus named immature insects as 'masks' concealing the adult form within.
The immature, wingless, often worm-like form of an insect before metamorphosis; more broadly, the juvenile stage of any animal that undergoes transformation into a different adult form.
From Latin 'larva' (ghost, specter, mask). The Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus applied this term to the immature stage of insects in 1768, drawing a striking metaphor: the larva is a 'mask' or 'ghost' that conceals the true form of the adult insect within. Just as a Roman 'larva' was a departed spirit or the mask worn to represent one, the biological larva disguises the creature's final identity. The metaphor is remarkably apt — a caterpillar
Linnaeus named the immature insect stage 'larva' — Latin for 'ghost' or 'mask' — because the caterpillar masks the true identity of the adult within. The Roman Lares (household gods) and larvae (malevolent ghosts) may share the same root, linking household protection to the spirits of the dead.