feles

See also: fêlés and fêles

Latin

fēlēs (cat)

Alternative forms

faelēs, fēlis

Etymology

Unknown. Maybe cognate with Welsh bele (“marten”).[1]Other sources say that it's related to Latin fulica, fulix, with the etymological meaning of "animal with a shiny coat", but this theory is doubtful. The connection with Latin felix (“happy”) and Latin fello (“to suck”), with the (hypothetical) etymological meaning of "animal that sucks the blood [of its prey]” was also proposed. This word could be cognate with Latin meles (“badger”) with a very unusual alternation /f/ and /m/.

Pronunciation

(Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈfeː.leːs/, [ˈfeːɫ̪eːs̠]

(Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈfe.les/, [ˈfɛːles]
Audio (Classical) (file)

Noun

fēlēs f (genitive fēlis); third declension

cat
Synonyms: cattus, mūriceps, mūrilegus, pilax
- c. 45 BCE, Cicero, Tusculan Disputations 5.27:
  Quorum inbutae mentes pravitatis erroribus quamvis carnificinam prius subierint quam ibim aut aspidem aut faelem aut canem aut corcodillum violenti quorum etiamsi inprudentes quippiam fecerint, poenam nullam recusent.
  Their minds being tainted by pernicious opinions, they are ready to bear any torture rather than hurt an ibis, a snake, a cat, a dog, or a crocodile; and should any one inadvertently have hurt any of these animals, he will submit to any punishment.
- 1528, Desiderius Erasmus, Adagiorum opus, p. 773:
  Ut feles quoties fugitat, male pedere sueta est.
  Whenever the cat runs away, she is accustomed to fart badly.
- 1556, Conrad Gessner, Aeliani de natura animalium, Liber VI, Cap. XXVII, p. 336:
  Quemadmodum ex felibus mas est libidinosissimus, sic amantissima catulorum femina; quae veneream idcirco maris consuetudinem refugit, quod is calidissimum ignisque simile semen emittat, genitale ut feminae conburat.
  Just as out of the cats, the male is most libidinous, so too is the female of kittens most affectionate; and on that account she runs away from sexual intercourse with the male because he emits the hottest semen like fire, and so burns up the genital organ of the female.
- 1607, Antoine Mizauld, Opusculorum pars secunda, p. 72v:
  Capitale fuisse apud Aegyptios felem sponte, vel casu occidisse, Diodorus perpulchram demonstrat historiam, suos oculos ac fidem in testimonium adducens, ne putetur esse fabula.
  Diodorus describes, bringing his eyes as well as his faith into the telling lest it be thought a fable, a very beautiful account that among the Egyptians it was punishable by death to deliberately or by accident kill a cat.

Usage notes

Fēlis is the genitive singular form of fēlēs, but it is also an alternate nominative and vocative form of fēlēs.

Declension

Third-declension noun (i-stem).

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	fēlēs	fēlēs
Genitive	fēlis	fēlium
Dative	fēlī	fēlibus
Accusative	fēlem	fēlēs fēlīs
Ablative	fēle	fēlibus
Vocative	fēlēs	fēlēs

Derived terms

fēlīneus
fēlīnus
fēliō

References

De Vaan, Michiel (2008) Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 7)‎, Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN

“feles”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
“feles”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
feles in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette

[1] De Vaan, Michiel (2008) Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 7)‎, Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN