grex
English
Etymology
Latin grex (“flock”).
Noun
grex (plural greges or grexes)
- (biology) A multicellular aggregate of amoeba.
- (horticulture) A kind of group used in horticultural nomenclature, applied to the progeny of an artificial cross from specified parents, in particular for orchids.
- Synonym: gx
Further reading
- Grex (horticulture) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
Latin
Etymology
From Proto-Indo-European *h₂ger- (“to assemble, gather together”). See also Spanish grey (“flock, crowd”) Lithuanian gurguole (“mass, crowd”) and gurgulys (“chaos, confusion”), Old Church Slavonic гроусти (grusti, “handful”), Sanskrit गण (gaṇá, “flock, troop, group”) and ग्राम (grā́ma, “troop, collection, multitude; village, tribe”), and Ancient Greek ἀγείρω (ageírō, “I gather, collect”), whence ἀγορά (agorá). See Proto-Germanic *kruppaz (“lump, round mass, body, crop”).
Pronunciation
- (Classical) IPA(key): /ɡreks/, [ɡrɛks̠]
- (Ecclesiastical) IPA(key): /ɡreks/, [ɡrɛks]
Noun
grex m (genitive gregis); third declension
- (zoology) a group of smaller animals: a flock (of birds, sheep, etc.), a pack (of dogs, wolves, etc.), a swarm (of insects), etc.
- (figuratively) a similar group of other things
- Synonyms: cumulus, acervus, massa, mōlēs, multitūdō
- a group of people: a crowd, a clique, a company, a band, a troop, etc.
- Synonyms: multitūdō, turba
- (sports) a team of charioteers.
- (theater) a troupe of actors.
Usage notes
Properly, a herd or drove of larger animals form a pecus n, a iumentum (when pulling carts), or an armenta (when pulling a plow), while smaller animals—especially domesticated pecudēs—form a grex. Its use for people is not necessarily pejorative in the way pecus is.
Declension
Third-declension noun.
Case | Singular | Plural |
---|---|---|
Nominative | grex | gregēs |
Genitive | gregis | gregum |
Dative | gregī | gregibus |
Accusative | gregem | gregēs |
Ablative | grege | gregibus |
Vocative | grex | gregēs |
Hyponyms
- pecus
Derived terms
- gregālis
- gregārius
- gregātim
Related terms
- gregō
Descendants
- Italian: gregge
- Old Leonese: gree
- Old Portuguese: grei
- Portuguese: grei, grege
- Galician: grea, grei
- Old Spanish: grey
- Spanish: grey
- → Albanian: grigjë
- → English: grex
References
- “grex”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- “grex”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
- grex in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette
- Carl Meißner; Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book, London: Macmillan and Co.
- a theatrical company: familia, grex, caterva histrionum
- the manager: dominus gregis
- to feed a flock (of goats): pascere gregem
- the herds are grazing: greges pascuntur (Verg. G. 3. 162)
- a theatrical company: familia, grex, caterva histrionum
- "Pecus; Jumentum; Armentum; Grex" in H.H. Arnold's translation of Ludwig von Döderlein's Hand-Book of Latin Synonymes (1841), pp. 158–9.