Parca

See also: parca and parça

Italian

Etymology

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Proper noun

Parca m or f by sense

1. a surname

Further reading

• Stefano Ravara, Mappa dei Cognomi, 2015-2024

Latin

Etymology

Suggestions include:

• parcō (“I spare”)
• pariō (“I give birth”)
• plicō, plectō (“I plait”)

Proper noun

Parca f (genitive Parcae); first declension

1. one of the Fates (one of the three goddesses who control destiny)
   • 29 BCE – 19 BCE, Virgil, Aeneid 1.21–22:

     hinc populum, lātē rēgem bellōque superbum,
     ventūrum excidiō Libyae: sīc volvere Parcās.

     Because these people, wide-ruling and proud in war,
     would come to destroy Libya: The Fates [were] thus to spin.
     (Rome would defeat Carthage in Libya; the Fates spun, measured and cut the metaphorical threads of life. See: Parcae. Notes: regem is an abbreviation of present active participle regentem or regnantem, “ruling”; bello is an ablative of respect, “in respect to war”; excidio is a dative of purpose, “for the destruction.” The grammar and idiom of sic volvere Parcas is variously interpreted, e.g.: “thus the Fates were spinning,” “the Fates had so decreed.”)

Declension

First-declension noun.

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	Parca	Parcae
Genitive	Parcae	Parcārum
Dative	Parcae	Parcīs
Accusative	Parcam	Parcās
Ablative	Parcā	Parcīs
Vocative	Parca	Parcae

References

• “Parca”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “Parca”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• Parca in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.

Spanish

Proper noun

Parca f

1. Grim Reaper

Related terms

• Parcas