Dinomyrmex

Dinomyrmex gigas (Latreille 1802) is one of the largest ant species of the world, living in the South East Asian rain forests.

This species can be easily recognised by its size. It is black in color, except the gaster, which can vary from bright orange to reddish brown to light brown.

Its habitat ranges from the South of Thailand, the mainland of Malaysia, Singapore, the islands of Sumatra, Java and Borneo as well as the Philippines. They can be found in areas ranging from peat swamps of the mangrove forests up to the mountain forests at 1500 m above sea level.

For many ant keepers and ant lovers, they are considered a dream species, one of the holy grails.

These ants are commonly known as Giant Forest Ants, but during my research I also found someone referring to them as Terror Ants, which I found curious. It was only after doing the usual research of the etymology of their scientific name that I realized why it was.

Dinomyrmex is the combination of dino, from Ancient Greek δεινός (deinós), meaning “terrible, awesome, mighty, fearfully great” and myrmex, from Ancient Greek μύρμηξ (múrmēx), meaning “ant”.

Gigas is derived from the Greek word γίγας (gígas), meaning "giant".

As such it can be translated as the Terrible or Mighty Giant Ant, depending on how you want to look at them.