scarabaeus

See also: Scarabaeus

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Latin scarabaeus. Doublet of scarab.

Noun

scarabaeus (plural scarabaei or scarabaeuses)

Obsolete form of scarab.
- 1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:
  What did she mean about the scarabæus too? It was Leo's scarabæus, and had come out of the old coffer that Vincey had left in my rooms nearly one-and-twenty years before.

Latin

Alternative forms

scarabēus

Etymology

Unknown, perhaps a foreign word, or with movable s- connected to the large family of words for shrimps, crayfish, scorpions and crabs beginning with /kaɾ/ mentioned at Persian (xarčang, “crab”) to which Ancient Greek κάραβος (kárabos, “beetle; crayfish”) is to be set in this context.

Pronunciation

(Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ska.raˈbae̯.us/, [s̠käräˈbäe̯ʊs̠]
(modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ska.raˈbe.us/, [skäräˈbɛːus]

Noun

scarabaeus m (genitive scarabaeī); second declension

A scarab, black dung beetle, revered in Ancient Egypt.
A beetle

Declension

Second-declension noun.

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	scarabaeus	scarabaeī
Genitive	scarabaeī	scarabaeōrum
Dative	scarabaeō	scarabaeīs
Accusative	scarabaeum	scarabaeōs
Ablative	scarabaeō	scarabaeīs
Vocative	scarabaee	scarabaeī

Descendants

Aragonese: escarabaxo
Asturian: escarabayu
→ Bulgarian: скарабе́й (skarabéj)
→ Catalan: escarabeu (learned)
→ Esperanto: skarabo
Old French: escharbot
- Middle French: escarbot
  - French: escarbot
→ Middle French: scarabée (learned)
- French: scarabée
- → English: scarab
  - → Irish: scarab
  - → Welsh: sgarab
Galician: escaravello
→ German: Skarabäus
→ Italian: scarabeo (learned)
→ Polish: skarabeusz
Portuguese: escaravelho
→ Russian: скарабей (skarabej)
Spanish: escarabajo
Translingual: Scarabaeus
⇒ Vulgar Latin: *scarafaius
- Catalan: escarabat
- Italian: scarafaggio
- Romansch: scarafag
- Sicilian: scravagghiu

References

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