Lactantius

Latin

Alternative forms

• Lact. (abbreviation)

Etymology

From lactāns (“suckling”) +‎ -ius.

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /lakˈtan.ti.us/, [ɫ̪äkˈt̪än̪t̪iʊs̠]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /lakˈtan.t͡si.us/, [läkˈt̪änt̪͡s̪ius]

Proper noun

Lactantius m sg (genitive Lactantiī or Lactantī); second declension

1. A masculine cognomen — famously held by:
   1. Lucius Caecilius Firmianus Lactantius (circa AD 250–325), a celebrated father of the Church, famous for the purity of his Latin style, and sometimes called the Christian Cicero

Declension

Second-declension noun, singular only.

Case	Singular
Nominative	Lactantius
Genitive	Lactantiī Lactantī1
Dative	Lactantiō
Accusative	Lactantium
Ablative	Lactantiō
Vocative	Lactantī

¹Found in older Latin (until the Augustan Age).

Descendants

• French: Lactance

References

• “Lactantĭus”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• Lactantĭus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette, page 881/1.

Further reading

• Lucius Caecilius Firmianus Lactantius on the Latin Wikipedia.Wikipedia ^la