xiphias
See also: Xiphias
English
WOTD – 26 April 2011
Etymology
Borrowed from translingual Xiphias or Latin xiphiās (“swordfish”).
Pronunciation
- (UK) IPA(key): /ˈzɪfiəs/
Audio (UK) (file)
Noun
xiphias
- Synonym of swordfish
- 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto XII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, OCLC 960102938:
- Huge Ziffius, whom Mariners eschew / No lesse, then rockes, as travellers informe […]
- 1700, Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London, volume 3, page 38:
- S. Malpighi having dissected the Head of a Xiphias or Sword Fish, which hath a very big Eye, observ'd that the middle of the Optick Nerve is nothing else, but a large Membrane, folded according to its length in many Doubles almost like a Fan, and invested by the Dura Mater.
- 1857, Bostock & Riley, “part 32.vi”, in Natural History, translation of original by Pliny:
- Trebius Niger informs us that […] the xiphias, or, in other words, the sword-fish, has a sharp-pointed muzzle, with which it is able to pierce the sides of a ship and send it to the bottom […]
- 23 May 1863, Prof. Huxley, “Structure and development of the vertebrate skeleton”, in The Lancet:
- In the xiphias, you observe, the enormous elongation of the head is produced by the elongation of the jaws proper – that is to say, of the pre-maxilla and nasal bones.
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Translations
xiphias — see swordfish
Latin
xiphiās (a swordfish)
Etymology
From Ancient Greek ξιφίας (xiphías), derived from ξίφος (xíphos, “sword”).
Pronunciation
- (Classical) IPA(key): /ˈksi.pʰi.aːs/, [ˈks̠ɪpʰiäːs̠]
- (Ecclesiastical) IPA(key): /ˈksi.fi.as/, [ˈksiːfiäs]
Audio (Classical) (file)
Noun
xiphiās m (genitive xiphiae); first declension
- a swordfish, Xiphias gladius
- a sword-shaped comet
Declension
First-declension noun (masculine Greek-type with nominative singular in -ās).
| Case | Singular | Plural |
|---|---|---|
| Nominative | xiphiās | xiphiae |
| Genitive | xiphiae | xiphiārum |
| Dative | xiphiae | xiphiīs |
| Accusative | xiphiān | xiphiās |
| Ablative | xiphiā | xiphiīs |
| Vocative | xiphiā | xiphiae |
Synonyms
- (swordfish): gladius
Related terms
- xiphion
Descendants
- Translingual: Xiphias
References
- “xiphias”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- “xiphias”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
- xiphias in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette