Marathon i an (marathon i an)

and n. [L. Marathon, L. mar a thrum, fennel), + -ian.] I. a. Of or pertaining to Marathon in Attica, the site of the famous battle in which the A then i ans and Platœans overthrew the Persians in 490 B. c.: as, the Marathon i an bull overcome by These us; the Marathon i an mound or tumulus (the burial-place of the Greeks killed in the battle, still existing). II. n . Same as Maced on i an , 2. Marattia (ma-rat'i-a), n. [NL. (Swartz, 1806), named after J. F. Maratti of Vallombrosa in Tuscany, a writer on ferns.) A genus of ferns, typical of the order Marattiacea. They are coarse habited plants, having large scaly rhizomes and ample twice or thrice-pinnate fronds, with oblong pinnules, bearing the sori in lines near the margin. Many fo il ferns showing both fronds and fructification closely resembling those of this genus occur, chiefly in Tria ic (Rhetic) strata, and were called Mar att i ops is by Schimper, who united with that genus all the forms which had been called Angiopteri dium, since found very abundant in the Mesozoic beds of India, and quite recently in the Potomac formation of Virginia.