bronchia

Forms

bronchia n pl (genitive bronchiōrum); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek βρόγχια (brónkhia, “bronchial tubes”),^[2][3][1] a derivative of βρόγχος (brónkhos, “windpipe, throat”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Caelius Aurelianus, in the 5th century AD, reports that Asclepiades placed a disease in those parts of the lungs attached to the windpipe, “which they call bronchia”.^[5][6]

Semantic evolution

In Latin it stayed a medical term for the bronchial tubes.^[2][7] From it English took bronchia in the 1670s.^[8]

Timeline

• 5th century AD – Caelius Aurelianus uses it in his work on acute diseases.^[5][6]
• 1670s – English borrows it as bronchia.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. (plural, anatomy) The bronchial tubes, the branches of the windpipe.^[2][3][7]

Related words

• bronchus

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
3. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
4. ^ Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010), Etymological Dictionary of Greek, with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 10, Leiden; Boston: Brill
5. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
6. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ a b Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
8. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com