instar

An instar of the mayfly Cloeon dipterum

From Latin instar (“form, likeness”), which is of obscure origin.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈɪnstɑː/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈɪnstɑɹ/
• Hyphenation: in‧star

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instar (plural instars)

1. Any one of the several stages of postembryonic development which an arthropod undergoes, between molts, before it reaches sexual maturity.
2. An arthropod at a specified one of these stages of development.
   • 2005, Nematodes as biocontrol agents (edited by Parwinder S. Grewal, Ralf-Udo Ehlers, David I. Shapiro-Ilan), page 133:

     In A. orientalis, first and second instars were more susceptible than third instars to H. bacteriophora TF strain, […]

3. (by extension) A stage in development.
   • 1955, Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita:

     We avoided Tourist Homes, country cousins of Funeral ones, old-fashioned, genteel and showerless, with elaborate dressing tables in depressingly white-and-pink little bedrooms, and photographs of the landlady’s children in all their instars.

From in- +‎ star.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ɪnˈstɑː/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ɪnˈstɑɹ/

instar (third-person singular simple present instars, present participle instarring, simple past and past participle instarred)

1. (transitive, archaic) To stud or adorn with stars or other brilliants; to star.
   • 1882, Frederick Randolph Abbe, The temple rebuilt: a poem, page 125:

     Yet mark with shining steps the humbler way;

     And, as angelic feet instar the sky,

     Drop the bright sparks along the wilderness.

   • 1893, in The Atlantic Monthly, volume 72, page 507:

     Espey could distinguish through the clear darkness the fringed branches of a pine-tree clinging to the heights above and waving against the instarred sky, and below a vague moving whiteness […]

   • 1896, Mary Noailles Murfree (pseudonym Charles Egbert Craddock) In the Tennessee mountains, edition 14, page 209:

     He was dreaming, surely; or were those deep, instarred eyes really fixed upon him with that wistful gaze which he had seen only twice before?

2. (transitive) To make a star of; set as a star.

• S-train, Sartin, Strain, Tarins, Trains, atrins, santir, sartin, starin', strain, tairns, tarins, trains

From Latin īnstar (“of the same weight”).

• IPA^(key): /ɛ̃s.taʁ/
• Hyphenation: in‧star

instar

1. Only used in à l'instar de (“just like”)

• à l'instar de

• “instar” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Of obscure origin.

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈin.star/, [ˈĩː.star]

īnstar n (indeclinable)

1. image, likeness, resemblance
2. counterpart
3. worth, value
4. an equal form (of)

Not declined; used only in the nominative and accusative singular.

• French: instar

• instar in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• instar in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• instar in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire Illustré Latin-Français, Hachette

From Latin īnstō (“urge, insist”).

• IPA^(key): /insˈtaɾ/, [ĩnsˈt̪aɾ]

instar (first-person singular present insto, first-person singular preterite insté, past participle instado)

1. (intransitive) to urge (press someone to do something soon)

   Synonyms: urgir, apretar

2. (transitive) to insist (repeat a plea)

   Synonym: insistir

• instancia

• “instar” in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014.