tragus

Forms

tragus m (genitive tragī); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek τράγος (trágos, “he-goat”).^[2][3][1] The Greek word also meant the smell of a he-goat, a fish (the male μαινίς (mainís)) and several plants, spelt among them.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The historian Sisenna uses it for a kind of boat.^[2][5]

Semantic evolution

Ovid's poem on fishing and Pliny the Elder use it for a fish, which Pliny identifies as the male maena in the breeding season;^[2][6] Pliny also gives it to a sponge, to a plant also called scorpiō and to an unidentified cereal brought from the East.^[2][5] Martial uses it for the goat-like smell of the body,^[2][6] and Paul the Deacon's abridgement of Festus for a shellfish with a bad taste.^[2]

Medieval Latin used it for a goat, a rough sponge and a shrub.^[7][8] In English, Modern Latin tragus became in the 1690s the name of the small projection at the opening of the ear, after a tuft of hair there that resembles a goat's beard.^[9]

Timeline

• 120–67 BC – Sisenna uses it for a kind of boat.^[2][8]
• 43 BC–AD 18 – Ovid uses it for a fish.^[2][6][8]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it for a fish, a sponge, a plant and a cereal.^[2][8]
• 40–102/103 AD – Martial uses it for body odour.^[2][6][8]
• 14th century – Köbler records the medieval sense “sponge”.^[8]
• 1690s – English uses Modern Latin tragus for a part of the ear.^[9]

Meanings

Noun

1. A goat-like body odour.^[2][6]
2. A fish, the male maena in the breeding season.^[2][6]
3. A shellfish with a bad taste.^[2]
4. A kind of sponge.^[2][5]
5. A plant, the same as scorpiō.^[2]
6. An unidentified cereal.^[2][5]
7. A kind of boat.^[2][5]
8. (Medieval Latin) A goat.^[7]
9. (Medieval Latin) A shrub of the genus Ephedra.^[7]
10. (New Latin, anatomy) The tragus of the ear.^[9]

Related words

• English tragus

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
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 c d e Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b c Latham, R. E., D. R. Howlett, R. K. Ashdowne, et al. (1975–2013), Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, London: British Academy / Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
9. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com