Green anaconda

The green anaconda (Eunectes murinus), also known as common anaconda and water boa, is a non-venomous boa species found in South America. It is the heaviest and one of the longest known extant snake species. The term anaconda often refers to this species, though the term could also apply to other members of the genus Eunectes.

The green anaconda's scientific name is derived from the Greek εὐνήκτης, meaning "good swimmer", and the Latin 'murinus', meaning "of mice", for being thought to prey on mice. "The name first was probably from the Sinhala language of Sri Lanka, formerly Ceylon, and that in 1869, the Englishman John Ray wrote of "anacandaia of the Ceylonese, i.e., he that crushes the limbs of the buffaloes and yoke beasts." For more than one hundred years the name was applied to a (python) snake from Ceylon, but in the nineteenth century experts began to use it for a snake residing in the Amazon basin.[citation needed]