Antedating of "Amphibian" (n.)

[Shapiro, Fred]

amphibian, n. (OED 1835)

1749 _Universal Magazine of Knowledge and Pleasure_ IV. 212 (Eighteenth Century Collections Online)  This rarity of a creature has three large hearts that hang together in one string; and as the _Manatee_ is, so is she, an amphibion [sic] that lives in the water, and without it; that swims like a fish, yet in the sand lays eggs like a fowl; whose fish is flesh, and admits of various tastes; as of veal, of beef, but the fat is green, and eats like marrow; and their eggs undistinguishable from those of a hen; which, if pickled, strung up, and barbacued in the sun, are little or nothing inferior to buttargo.

Fred Shapiro

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