Emily Dickinson Lexicon

PAR'A-SITE, n. [Fr. parasite; It. parassito; Sp. parasito; L. parasita; from Gr. παρασιτος; παρα, by, and σιτος, corn.]

1. In ancient Greece, a priest or minister of the gods whose office was to gather of the husbandman the corn allotted for public sacrifices. The public storehouse in which this corn was deposited was called παρασιτον. The parasites also superintended the sacrifices. – Potter's Antiq.
2. In modern usage, a trencher friend; one that frequents the tables of the rich and earns his welcome by flattery; a hanger on; a fawning flatterer. – Milton. Dryden.
3. In botany, a plant without the means of providing nutriment for itself, or of elaborating crude sap into proper sap, but obtaining nourishment immediately from other plants to which it attaches itself, and whose juices it absorbs. A parasite is different from an epiphyte, – which see.
4. In entomology, parasites are insects which in some stage of their existence, eat the bodies or the eggs of other insects and frequently destroy them.