neritic

adjective

ne·​rit·​ic nə-ˈri-tik 

: of, relating to, inhabiting, or constituting the belt or region of shallow water adjoining the seacoast

Examples of neritic in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

For example, scientists know megamouths roam the neritic and oceanic waters of tropical and subtropical latitudes, spanning depths from the surface down to the bathypelagic zone over 3937 ft (1200 m) deep. —Melissa Cristina Marquez, Forbes, 31 Oct. 2024

Word History

Etymology

borrowed from German neritisch, from Greek Nērítēs, a mythological figure, the son of Nereus and Doris, the daughter of Oceanus (from Nēr-, stem of Nēreús nereus and Nērēís nereid + -itēs -ite entry 1) + German -isch -ish (with -ic entry 1 substituting for -isch)

Note: The term was introduced by Ernst haeckel in "Plankton-Studien" ("vorgetragen in der Sitzung der medicinisch-naturwissenschaftlichen Gesellschaft zu Jena am 28. November 1890"—"presented at a session of the Jena Society for Medicine and the Physical Sciences on November 28, 1890"), Jenaische Zeitschrift für Naturwissenschaft, 52. Band (Neue Folge, 18. Band) (1891), p. 253. In introducing the word, Haeckel makes a distinction between oceanic plankton and neritic plankton; the latter "… include the floating flora and fauna of coastal regions, both of the continents and of archipelagos and islands" ("… umfasst die schwimmende Fauna und Flora der Küsten-Regionen, sowohl der Continente, als der Archipele und Inseln"). As the source of the term he cites in a footnote "Νηρίτης, Sohn des Nereus, Enkel des Pontus und der Gaea" ("Nērítēs, son of Nereus, grandson of Pontus and Gaea").

First Known Use

1891, in the meaning defined above