Everything2
Near Matches
Ignore Exact
Full Text
Everything2

Plural forms of "clitoris"

created by tregoweth

(idea) by Gritchka (2.5 y) (print)   ?   (I like it!) 6 C!s Sun Feb 04 2001 at 17:44:25

Uh oh, I was just doing some drive-by voting when I happen to come across this one, and the linguist bit puts its hand up and says "ooh, ooh, miss, I know this one"; and the part with pudor says to just keep on driving and not draw attention to myself.

Okay. It's clitorides (and someone had already done that under that node), stressed on the O. It's from Greek κλειτορις kleitorís, third declension feminine, plural kleitorides. So in Latin this becomes clitoris, plural clitorides, and strictly the first vowel should have been long as in climax.

(Of course, as it's English we're speaking you should just go and use the English plural clitorises.)

There were Greek words kleitoriazein and kleitorizein 'to touch the clitoris', which could usefully be borrowed into English as 'to clitorize'. A good classical word, don't be afraid to use it. Or do it.

The genitive is therefore clitoridis. I mention this because one dictionary has a mistake in it -- I think it was Chambers, but I can't find the entry now -- but it was made by false analogy: since the Latin genitive of penis is penis, you would say os penis 'bone of the penis', which actually exists in non-humans. So by analogy they say the bone of the clitoris is the os clitoris when of course it would really be os clitoridis, and I know I'm starting to get silly talking about bones, it wasn't bone, it was... it was something they both have...

And yes I know this is getting... anal retentive can't be right, either... in this context... fixated? Yes, I think fixated just about covers it. You can go now, I've finished.


printable version
chaos

clitorides clit lit Toothpicks: Harmless tools useful in maintaining dental hygiene, or HORRIBLE, DEADLY WEAPONS!? Your Latin roots are showing
vagina dentata If the only sexual organ you have is a penis then everything looks like a vagina clitoridectomy pudor
Clit piercing clitoris Using a nuke to form a lake cunning linguist
clit Pippi Longstocking December 13, 2000 : the concession speech of Al Gore Vaginati
Fundamental theorem of calculus Share and enjoy! Feynman diagram How to avoid people whom you don't like talking to
Sweet Home Alabama declension cunnilingus How To Speak in Orc : Advanced
Y'know, if you log in, you can write something here, or contact authors directly on the site. Create a New User if you don't already have an account.
  Epicenter
Login
Password

password reminder
register

Everything2 Help


cooled by mauler

Cool Staff Picks
The best nodes of all time:
A Tail of Two Monkeys
Freenet
we lose weeks like buttons, like pencils
Jane's Fighting Nodes
Tampopo
Hong Kong movie subtitles
Ferris wheel
How to pick up women
The Real Foreign Debt
Starship Troopers
Great Lakes
I will be the first thing you will be thinking about after you wake
Galapagos Islands
New Writeups
Nadine_2
The Sound Of Madness(review)
Twin Eclipse
Conversations with God: An Uncommon Dialogue(idea)
SwimmingMonkey
Conversations with Fo Fo- the Loneliest dog in Purgatory(fiction)
locke baron
lynx(thing)
Simulacron3
Reality, Dimensions and the Natural Ontology(essay)
SubSane
Making Love to a 9-Foot Woman(person)
Ouzo
Thoughts(idea)
antigravpussy
I fall silent, listening. The breadcrumbs are talking about us(person)
calgon
Buffalo Bill by the pool(poetry)
gate
Anarchy is Order(idea)
ushdfgakjasgh
Scribeling(thing)
XWiz
Trism(review)
artman2003
Briefcase Full of Souls - Part I(fiction)
Dreamvirus
Alan Ladd(person)
waverider37
Harold Holt(person)
This affordable entertainment brought to you by The Everything Development Company