platypus: [18] The platypus’s name means literally ‘flat-footed’. It was given to it at the end of the 18th century, and is first recorded in George Shaw’s Naturalists’ Miscellany 1799. It was adapted from Greek platúpous, a compound formed from platús ‘flat’ (source of English place, plaice, and plane the tree) and poús ‘foot’ (a relative of English foot). => foot, place, plane, plate[platypus etymology, platypus origin, 英语词源]