Definition of "madrepore" []

• Any of various stony corals of the order Madreporaria, which includes the reef builders of tropical seas. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "But in order to do this, he must have been thoroughly familiar with the enormous madrepore of the sewer in all its ramifications and in all its openings."
• "The sub-soil of Paris, if the eye could penetrate its surface, would present the aspect of a colossal madrepore."
• "This is a great mass of madrepore, and in the living state every one of the ends of these branches was terminated by a beautiful little polype, like a sea anemone, and all the skeleton was covered by a soft body which united the polypes together."