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Definitions

chrysalis

[kris-uh-lis] / ˈkrɪs ə lɪs /


Example Sentences

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Trefry likened this awkward time of life to the stage in a butterfly’s development when a caterpillar disappears inside a chrysalis and dissolves into goo before reforming into something entirely new.

From Salon Nov. 24, 2025

Nearly every one of those caterpillars at some point drops from the tree canopy to overwinter or create a chrysalis.

From The Wall Street Journal Oct. 31, 2025

But Nirupama Rao, former Indian ambassador to Beijing and Washington, says India is "a titan in chrysalis" - too large and ambitious to bind itself to any single great power.

From BBC Aug. 29, 2025

Also like Mozart, Tao emerged from the often-precarious chrysalis of childhood as a prodigy to become a complex artist, tirelessly curious to seek out new challenges.

From Seattle Times Feb. 28, 2024

They emerge as from a chrysalis, silently, their faces turned up toward the bright moon.

From "What the Night Sings" by Vesper Stamper

If you spent a week in the dry forest as a child, examining chrysalides and ocelot droppings, you might, as an adult, see the forest as something other than a purely economic resource.

From The New Yorker Mar. 30, 2015

There, softly trembling in the shadows, sleep A thousand thoughts, funereal chrysalides, Phantoms of old the folding darkness hides, Who make faint flutterings as their wings unfold, Rose-washed and azure-tinted, shot with gold.

From The Poems and Prose Poems of Charles Baudelaire with an Introductory Preface by James Huneker by Charles Baudelaire

The butterflies of the summer brood emerge shortly after, but the chrysalides of the next brood hybernate till the following spring.

From Butterflies and Moths (British) by William S. Furneaux

When I kept caterpillars, or rather raised butterflies, they never were tired of watching the chrysalides, hoping to see the expected butterflies.

From Guide to the Kindergarten and Intermediate Class and Moral Culture of Infancy. by Mary E. Mann

The chrysalides are often hairy, though some of them are perfectly smooth.

From Butterflies and Moths (British) by William S. Furneaux

The world’s top AI companies are now emerging from their private-market chrysalises to sell shares via initial public offerings.

From Barron's Jun. 10, 2026

For instance, well-meaning people have bought monarch-rearing kits online and even taken monarch butterfly chrysalises out of the wild to rear indoors.

From National Geographic Oct. 4, 2023

Then they transition to pupae, or chrysalises, for a week or two before emerging, or eclosing, for a short, winged adulthood.

From Seattle Times Oct. 13, 2022

They lived in a mesh cage and grew bigger, much like the hero of Carle’s book, until they crawled and wiggled toward the top of the container, turning themselves into chrysalises.

From Los Angeles Times May 27, 2021

As if newly emerged from their chrysalises, the butterflies gathered their strength and began to fly.

From "Summer of the Mariposas" by Guadalupe García McCall




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