Molted

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. The shedding of an outer layer, which facilitates growth and change, is commonly seen in various species like reptiles and insects
2. The process where animals lose an outer covering in order to develop further is typical in certain insects and reptiles
3. The act of discarding an outer layer to promote growth is observed in numerous organisms, particularly among reptiles and insects

Etymology: "Molted" is the past tense and past participle of "molt," and the verb's story is a tangle of two unrelated Latin and Germanic lines that merged in English. One line runs through Latin "mūtō," meaning "to change" or "to exchange," which came into Old English as a word for change and gave rise to the Middle English "mouten" and the spelling "moult," which was the form used for the shedding of feathers and skin. The other line is Germanic: Old English "meltan" meant "to melt, to digest, to be fully destroyed," and its past-tense forms "multe" and "multon" fed into Middle English as "molte," which was a separate root that eventually fused with "moult." The merging is the surprising part. Two words with sharply different sources, one about change and one about dissolving, ended up as a single verb describing a creature shedding its outer covering. The spelling "molt," which is the American form, reflects the shorter Middle English "molte" more than the "moult" line that British English kept.

Synonyms: shed, cast off