sputum

See also: Sputum

English

Etymology

From New Latin, from Latin sputum (“that which is spit out, spittle”), from spuere (“to spit”).

Noun

sputum (countable and uncountable, plural sputums or sputa)

1. (physiology) Matter coughed up and expectorated from the mouth, composed of saliva and discharges from the respiratory passages such as mucus, phlegm or pus.
   • 2018, Louis Rosenfeld, Four Centuries of Clinical Chemistry:

     In the early 1890s the work in the laboratory consisted of postmortems, urinalyses, and examination of sputums.

   • 2020 February 24, James Hamblin, “You’re Likely to Get the Coronavirus”, in The Atlantic‎^[1]:

     At the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, the boy’s sputum sat for a month, waiting for its turn in a slow process of antibody-matching analysis.

Translations

matter coughed up and expectorated from the mouth

• Armenian: խորխ (hy) (xorx)
• Bashkir: ҡаҡырыҡ (qaqırıq)
• Bulgarian: храчки (bg) f pl (hrački)
• Catalan: esput m
• Czech: sputum (cs) n, chrchel (cs) m
• Finnish: yskös (fi)
• Galician: esgarro (gl), lapo m
• Georgian: ნერწყვი (nerc̣q̇vi), დორბლი (dorbli), შისველე (šisvele)
• German: Sputum (de) n
• Greek:

  Ancient: πτύσμα n (ptúsma)

• Hungarian: köpet (hu), váladék (hu)
• Korean: 가래 (ko) (garae)
• Polish: plwocina (pl) f
• Portuguese: escarro (pt) m
• Russian: мокрота (ru) f (mokrota)
• Spanish: esputo (es) m, escupitajo (es) m, gargajo (es) m, lapo (es) m
• Swahili: balaghamu (sw), kohozi (sw)
• Turkish: balgam (tr)
• Vietnamese: đờm (vi), đàm

Further reading

• sputum on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• “sputum”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “sputum”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “sputum”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

Czech

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [ˈspuːtum]
• Hyphenation: spu‧tum

Noun

sputum n

1. sputum

   Synonyms: chrchel, hlen

Declension

Declension of sputum (hard neuter foreign)

	singular	plural
nominative	sputum	sputa
genitive	sputa	sput
dative	sputu	sputům
accusative	sputum	sputa
vocative	sputum	sputa
locative	sputu	sputech
instrumental	sputem	sputy

Further reading

• “sputum”, in Příruční slovník jazyka českého (in Czech), 1935-1957
• “sputum”, in Slovník spisovného jazyka českého (in Czech), 1960–1971, 1989
• “sputum”, in Internetová jazyková příručka (in Czech)

Indonesian

Etymology

Learned borrowing from Latin sputum.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [ˈsputʊm]
• Hyphenation: spu‧tum

Noun

sputum (first-person possessive sputumku, second-person possessive sputummu, third-person possessive sputumnya)

1. (medicine) sputum.

   Synonyms: balgam, dahak

   Pemeriksaan sputum penting dilakukan untuk mendiagnosis berbagai penyakit pernafasan. ― Sputum examination is important for diagnosis of many respiratory diseases.

Further reading

• “sputum” in Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia, Jakarta: Agency for Language Development and Cultivation – Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology of the Republic of Indonesia, 2016.

Latin

Etymology

From spuō.

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈspuː.tum/, [ˈs̠puːt̪ʊ̃ˑ]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈspu.tum/, [ˈspuːt̪um]

Noun

spūtum n (genitive spūtī); second declension

1. spittle

Declension

Second-declension noun (neuter).

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	spūtum	spūta
Genitive	spūtī	spūtōrum
Dative	spūtō	spūtīs
Accusative	spūtum	spūta
Ablative	spūtō	spūtīs
Vocative	spūtum	spūta

Related terms

• sputō

Descendants

• Catalan: esput
• Dalmatian: spoit
• English: sputum
• Italian: sputo
• Old French: esput
• Portuguese: esputo
• Romanian: spută
• Spanish: esputo

Participle

spūtum

1. inflection of spūtus:
   1. nominative/accusative/vocative neuter singular
   2. accusative masculine singular

References

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