a. [ad. med.L. vermiform-is (whence F., It., Sp., and Pg. vermiforme), f. L. vermis worm: see -FORM. Cf. VERMES and VERMIS.
Vermiformal is used by Urquhart, Rabelais (1653), II. xiii. translating F. vermiforme.]
1. Zool. Having the form of a worm; resembling a worm in appearance or shape; long, thin, and more or less cylindrical.
1730. Bailey (fol.), Vermiform,… shaped like a Worm.
1816. Kirby & Sp., Entomol., I. 437. A covering of vermiform masses, apparently composed of honey and pollen.
1828. Stark, Elem. Nat. Hist., II. 211. Body elongated, but not vermiform or linear.
1857. Fraser’s Mag., LVI. 641. [It] feeds on the insects with its protruded vermiform tongue.
1881. Darwin, Veg. Mould, iv. (1882), 186. Five or six vermiform castings had been thrown up.
b. Of animals.
1826. Kirby & Sp., Entomol., IV. xlvii. 374. One species, which much resembles the vermiform larvæ of Hymenoptera.
1846. Patterson, Zool., 57. The Leeches and Worms present very much the same aspect as the vermiform or worm-shaped Echinodermata.
1846. Carpenter, Man. Phys., 505. In some of the lowest Vermiform (worm-like) Fishes, such as the Lamprey.
1883. Fisheries Exhib. Catal., 283. These young vermiform and semi-transparent eels.
c. spec. (see quot.)
1877. Coues, Fur Anim., iv. 116. In general form, the Stoat typifies a group of carnivorous Mammals aptly called ‘vermiform,’ in consideration of the extreme length, tenuity and mobility of the trunk, and shortness of the limbs.
2. Of or pertaining to, characteristic of, a worm; like or resembling that of a worm; vermicular.
1835–6. Todd’s Cycl. Anat., I. 327/2. The Spleen … in Birds … sometimes presents an elongated and vermiform shape.
1859. Darwin, Orig. Spec. (1860), xiii. 442. If we look to the admirable drawings … of the development of this insect, we see no trace of the vermiform stage.
1878. Bell, Gegenbaur’s Comp. Anat., 118. In the Discophora they form tufts of filaments,… and execute vermiform movements.
3. Anat. a. Vermiform appendix or appendage, a small, worm-like process or diverticulum extending from the cæcum in man and a few other mammals.
(a) 1778. Encycl. Brit. (ed. 2), I. 368/2. Of the little vermiform appendix of the cæcum, it will be sufficient to say that its uses have never yet been ascertained.
1872. Huxley, Phys., vi. 150. An elongated, blind process … which from its shape is called the vermiform appendix of the cæcum.
1888. Rolleston & Jackson, Anim. Life, 28. Caecum with vermiform appendix … of rabbit.
(b) 1841. T. R. Jones, Anim. Kingd., 680. In Man, the Orangs,… and the Wombat,… both cæcum and vermiform appendage are met with.
1876. Bristowe, The. & Pract. Med. (1878), 674. Concretions are mostly found in the vermiform appendage and are the usual causes of perforative ulceration of this part.
b. Vermiform process, the median lobe of the cerebellum, the upper and lower laminæ of which are distinguished as the superior and inferior vermiform processes.
Also, = prec. (In some recent Dicts.)
1836. Penny Cycl., V. 332/1. The cerebellum…. In the centre of its upper surface there is a distinct prominence termed the vermiform process.
1840. E. Wilson, Anat. Vade M. (1842), 383. The cerebellum is divided into two lateral hemispheres or lobes, two minor lobes called superior and inferior vermiform processes, and some small lobules.
1899. Allbutt’s Syst. Med., VII. 497. A very little lymph on the superior vermiform process of the cerebellum.
Hence Vermiformous a., ‘shaped like a worm’ (Bailey, 1727, vol. II.).
