The corpus record — Latin

blatta1

blatta1 · f

an insect that shuns the light

Generated live from the audited Latin corpus — every figure on this page is a database query, not prose from memory.

Where it lives

Antoninus Heliogabalus 1 · 1.73/10k
Epistulae, Books VIII-IX 1 · 0.79/10k
Georgicon 1 · 0.71/10k
Epigrammata 3 · 0.53/10k
Carmina 1 · 0.45/10k
Naturalis Historia 8 · 0.2/10k
Res Rustica, Books I-IX 1 · 0.13/10k

What it meant

1. blatta — Lewis & Short

blatta, ae, f.,

I an insect that shuns the light; of several kinds, the cockroach, chafer, moth, etc., Plin. 29, 6, 39, § 139; 11, 28, 34, § 99: lucifuga, Verg. G. 4, 243 (per noctem vagans, Serv.); cf. Col. 9, 7, 5; Pall. 1, 37, 4; Hor. S. 2, 3, 119; Mart. 14, 37; cf. Voss, Verg. l. l.—On account of its mean appearance: amore cecidi tamquam blatta in pelvim, Laber. ap. Non. p. 543, 27.

2. blatta — Lewis & Short

blatta, ae, f.: blatta qro/mbos ai(/matos,

I a clot of blood, Gloss.—Hence,

II (Access. form blattea, Ven. Carm. 2, 3, 19.) Purple (similar in color to flowing blood; cf. Salmas. Vop. Aur. 46, and Plin. 9, 38, 62, § 135; late Lat.): purpura, quae blatta, vel oxyblatta, vel hyacinthina dicitur, Cod. Th. 4, 40, 1: serica, ib. 10, 20, 18: blattam Tyrus defert, Sid. Carm. 5, 48; Lampr. Elag. 33; Cassiod. Var. Ep. 1, 2.

In the wild

blattas Pliny the Elder, Naturalis Historia 30.14.p1
blattasque Martial, Epigrammata 6.61.7
blatta Pliny the Elder, Naturalis Historia 1.30.p79
blattis Vergil, Georgicon 4.243
blattis Pliny the Elder, Naturalis Historia 11.28.p2
blattas Martial, Epigrammata 14.37.2

6 of 16 attestations shown.

Where it came from

Ernout-Meillet, Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue latine Treated in Ernout-Meillet, Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue latine s.v. blatta (scan p. 96; entry #1283).

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Latin text and lemmatization derived from the Perseus Digital Library (canonical-latinLit), CC BY-SA 4.0. Lewis & Short (public domain) via Perseus. This derived data is shared under the same CC BY-SA 4.0 license.