cunnus
Latin
editAlternative forms
edit- cunnu (Pompeii)
Etymology
editUncertain. 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 Latin) IPA(key): /ˈkun.nus/, [ˈkʊnːʊs̠]
- (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA(key): /ˈkun.nus/, [ˈkunːus]
Noun
editcunnus m (genitive cunnī); second declension
- (usually vulgar) cunt, vagina (the female genitalia including their external as well as internal parts)
- (vulgar, derogatory, synecdochically) a woman seen as merely providing access to sex (also used of homosexual men)
- 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 even before Helen's time the fanny was the most bitter cause of war: but unknown to fame were the deaths of those whom, while they were snatching fickle love like wild-beasts, someone stronger than them slew like a bull does in the herd.
Usage notes
editThis was the only Latin word properly referring to the female genitalia, and the degree of its obscenity was context-dependent.[3] For example, in the curse tablet Audollent 135B,[4] addressed to a deity, the word is used in a list of names for body parts to be affected. Its appearance in literature also suggests it was not as rude or strongly tabooed as its English look-alike, cunt. The word occurs mainly in graffiti and epigram, most occurrences in the latter being by Martial.
Declension
editSecond-declension noun.
Case | Singular | Plural |
---|---|---|
Nominative | cunnus | cunnī |
Genitive | cunnī | cunnōrum |
Dative | cunnō | cunnīs |
Accusative | cunnum | cunnōs |
Ablative | cunnō | cunnīs |
Vocative | cunne | cunnī |
Descendants
editSee also
edit- cūlus (“anus, arse”)
- cūnae (“cradle, nest for young birds”)
- cuneus (“wedge”)
- cunīculus (“rabbit”)
- cunnilingus (“cuntlicker”)
References
edit- “cunnus” on page 518 of the Oxford Latin Dictionary (2nd ed., 2012)
- ^ 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
- ^ Adams, James Noel (1982) The Latin sexual vocabulary[1], Baltimore, Maryland: Johns Hopkins University Press, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 81
- ^ Audollent, Auguste Marie Henri (1904) Defixionum tabellae quotquot innotuerunt, page 191
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
Categories:
- Latin terms with unknown etymologies
- Latin terms derived from Proto-Indo-European
- Latin 2-syllable words
- Latin terms with IPA pronunciation
- Latin lemmas
- Latin nouns
- Latin second declension nouns
- Latin masculine nouns in the second declension
- Latin masculine nouns
- Latin vulgarities
- Latin derogatory terms
- Latin synecdoches
- Latin terms with quotations