Luca bos

Latin

Etymology

Lūca (“Lucanian”) + bōs (“cow”), to mean elephant because the Romans first saw elephants in Heraclea, a city in Lucania, as part of Pyrrhus of Epirus's army.

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈluː.ka boːs/, [ˈɫ̪uːkä boːs̠]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈlu.ka bos/, [ˈluːkä bɔs]

Noun

Lūca bōs f (irregular, variously declined, genitive Lūcae bovis); first declension, third declension

1. Lucanian cow (an epithet for elephant)
   • c. 99 BCE – 55 BCE, Lucretius, De rerum natura 5.1302
   • c. 99 BCE – 55 BCE, Lucretius, De rerum natura 5.1339
   • c. 77 CE – 79 CE, Pliny the Elder, Naturalis Historia 8.16

Declension

First-declension noun with a third-declension noun (irregular).

	singular	plural
nominative	Lūca bōs	Lūcae bovēs
genitive	Lūcae bovis	Lūcārum boum
dative	Lūcae bovī	Lūcīs bōbus Lūcīs būbus
accusative	Lūcam bovem	Lūcās bovēs
ablative	Lūcā bove	Lūcīs bōbus Lūcīs būbus
vocative	Lūca bōs	Lūcae bovēs

Synonyms

• elephāns
• barrus

Derived terms

• prius pariet locusta Lūcam bovem

References

• “Lūca bōs”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press