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spider
Table of Contents
References & Edit History Quick Facts & Related Topics
Images & Videos
lynx spider
Witness an orb-weaving spider using silk wrappings to immobilize grasshopper prey
spider
Do we really swallow spiders in our sleep?
Red widow spider A medically significant arachnid sheet-web weaver spider
Know how some spiders walk on the surface of the water
spider: trichobothrium Australian funnel-web spider
For Students
spider summary
Quizzes
Sea otter (Enhydra lutris), also called great sea otter, rare, completely marine otter of the northern Pacific, usually found in kelp beds. Floats on back. Looks like sea otter laughing. saltwater otters
Animal Group Names
Lion (panthera leo)
Deadliest Animals Quiz
Mute swan with cygnet. (birds)
Match the Baby Animal to Its Mama Quiz
Green tree python snake (Chondropython viridis) in a rainforest.
Creepy Crawlers Quiz
vulture. An adult bearded vulture at a raptor recovery center. The Gypaetus barbatus also known as the Lammergeier or Lammergeyer, is a bird of prey and considered an Old World vulture.
Animal Factoids
Read Next
Wasp spider. Argiope bruennichi. Orb-weaver spider. Spiders. Arachnid. Cobweb. Spider web. Spider's web. Spider silk. Black and yellow striped wasp spider spinning a web.
Do We Really Swallow Spiders in Our Sleep?
Black widow spider
9 of the World’s Deadliest Spiders
Discover
Queen Elizabeth II addresses at opening of Parliament. (Date unknown on photo, but may be 1958, the first time the opening of Parliament was filmed.)
All 119 References in “We Didn’t Start the Fire,” Explained
Close up of praying mantis walking on stone ground against a blurred background in Japan
6 Animals That Eat Their Mates
Statue of Nostradamus
Nostradamus and His Prophecies
Cleopatra hieroglyphic carving the Ancient Egyptian queen Cleopatra. Wall of the Temple of Horus at Edfu, Egypt.
What Did Cleopatra Look Like?
Car with a pickle design in the Zagreb Red Bull Soapbox Race, Zagreb, Croatia, September 14, 2019. (games, races, sports)
10 Unusual Sports
Salem Witch Trials. Photogravure after the painting by Walter McEwen titled - The Witches - circa 1890s.
How Rye Bread May Have Caused the Salem Witch Trials
airplane in flight (plane, aircraft, flying)
7 Puzzling Plane Disappearances

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Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students.
Also known as: Araneae, Araneida
Written by
Lorna R. Levi
Coauthor of A Guide to Spiders and Their Kin; cotranslator and coeditor of Invertebrate Zoology by A. Kaestner.
Lorna R. Levi,
Joseph Culin
Professor of Entomology, Clemson University, South Carolina.
Joseph Culin•All
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Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors.
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