[mod.L., a. Gr. ἔκδυσις, f. ἐκδύειν to put off.] The action of stripping or casting off, esp. of slough or dead skin in serpents and caterpillars, or of the chitinous integument in Crustacea. Also concr. that which is cast off, slough.
1854. J. Hogg, Microsc., II. iv. (1867), 581. The change consisting in what is termed ‘ecdysis,’ a casting off, or moulting only.
1881. Nature, XXIII. 17 Feb., 380/1. There has not been observed any inert stage before the transformations or ecdysis.
fig. 1863. Huxley, Man’s Place Nat., ii. 58. A skin of some dimension was cast [by ‘the human larva’] in the 16th century … a new ecdysis seems imminent.
1876. M. & F. Collins, Blacksmith & Sch. (1883), 191. There is to be an ecdysis.
