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General American usage agrees; turtle is often a general term; tortoise is used only in reference to terrestrial turtles or, more narrowly, only those members of Testudinidae, the family of modern land tortoises; and terrapin may refer to turtles that are small and live in fresh and brackish water, in particular the diamondback terrapin ...
The word turtle is borrowed from the French word tortue or tortre 'turtle, tortoise'. [3] It is a common name and may be used without knowledge of taxonomic distinctions. In North America, it may denote the order as a whole. In Britain, the name is used for sea turtles as opposed to freshwater terrapins and land-dwelling tortoises. In Australia ...
Tortoises and sea turtles were imported into San Francisco, Sacramento and various other Gold Rush towns throughout Alta California to feed the gold mining population. Galápagos tortoise and sea turtle bones were also recovered from the Gold Rush-era archaeological site, Thompson's Cove (CA-SFR-186H), in San Francisco, California. [145]
In other words, all tortoises are turtles, but not all turtles are tortoises. Both types of animals are part of the Testudines order, which encompasses all those domed-shelled reptiles we know and ...
Turtle carapaces and scutes from Red Sea turtles (Eretmochelys imbricata) were used in rings, bracelets, dishes, bowls, knife hilts, amulets, and combs. Carapaces from Kleinmann's tortoise were used as sounding boards for lutes, harps and mandolins. [16] Turtle shells were also used to make norvas, an instrument resembling a banjo. [26]
Jonathan (hatched c. 1832) [2] [3] is a Seychelles giant tortoise (Aldabrachelys gigantea hololissa), a subspecies of the Aldabra giant tortoise (Aldabrachelys gigantea).His approximate age is estimated to be 192 as of 2024, making him the oldest known living land animal.
The African spurred tortoise (Centrochelys sulcata), also called the sulcata tortoise, is an endangered species of tortoise inhabiting the southern edge of the Sahara Desert, the Sahel, in Africa. It is the largest mainland species of tortoise in Africa, and the third-largest in the world, after the Galapagos tortoise and Aldabra giant tortoise.
The World Turtle in Hindu mythology is known as Akūpāra (Sanskrit: अकूपार), or sometimes Chukwa.An example of a reference to the World Turtle in Hindu literature is found in Jñānarāja (the author of Siddhantasundara, writing c. 1500): "A vulture, whichever has only little strength, rests in the sky holding a snake in its beak for a prahara [three hours].