cunnus

Latin edit

Etymology edit

Uncertain. Various theories include:

Proto-Indo-European *kutnos (“cover”),^[1]^[2] cognate with cutis (“skin”). The metaphor is identical to the one connecting Latin vulva and English hull, albeit from a different Indo-European root.
A relationship to Latin cuneus (“wedge”).
From Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker- (“to cut”), evolved from an original sense of “gash”, “slit”.

Pronunciation edit

(Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈkun.nus/, [ˈkʊnːʊs̠]
(modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈkun.nus/, [ˈkunːus]

Noun edit

cunnus m (genitive cunnī); second declension

(vulgar) cunt, cunny (obscene word for the vulva)
(vulgar, synecdochically) a woman
- 40/41 CE, Horatius, Sermones, I, 3, 107:
  nam fuit ante Helenam cunnus taeterrima bellī
  causa, sed ignōtīs periērunt mortibus illī,
  quōs venerem incertam rapientīs mōre ferārum
  vīribus ēditior caedēbat ut in grege taurus.
  For before Helen's time there existed (many) a woman who was the dismal cause of war: but those fell by unknown deaths, whom pursuing uncertain venery, as the bull in the herd, the strongest slew.

Declension edit

Second-declension noun.

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	cunnus	cunnī
Genitive	cunnī	cunnōrum
Dative	cunnō	cunnīs
Accusative	cunnum	cunnōs
Ablative	cunnō	cunnīs
Vocative	cunne	cunnī

Descendants edit

Asturian: coñu
Catalan: cony
Dalmatian: con
French: con
Italian: conno
Neapolitan: cunnu
Occitan: con
Old Galician-Portuguese: cono m
- Galician: cona f, cono m
- Portuguese: cona f, cono m
Sicilian: cunnu
Spanish: coño
- → Dutch: conjo
- → Portuguese: coño
- → English: conyo
- → Tagalog: konyo
→ Czech: kunda
→ Slovak: kunda
→ Hungarian: cuni, cunci
→ Welsh: cont

See also edit

cūlus (“anus, arse”)
cūnae (“cradle, nest for young birds”)
cuneus (“wedge”)
cunīculus (“rabbit”)
cunnilingus (“cuntlicker”)

References edit

^ De Vaan, Michiel (2008), “cunnus”, in Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 7), Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN, page 154
^ Kroonen, Guus (2013), “*hauþan-”, in Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 11), Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN, page 217

Further reading edit

“cunnus”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
“cunnus”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers

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