The corpus record — Latin

vagina

sheath, scabbard

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

Where it lives

Datames 1 · 5.49/10k
Epithalamium de nuptiis Honorii Augusti 1 · 4.57/10k
De Cultu Feminarum 2 · 3.9/10k
Pro M. Marcello 1 · 3.61/10k
Psychomachia 2 · 3.33/10k
Phoenissae 1 · 2.45/10k
In Rufinum 1 · 1.75/10k
De Carne Christi 1 · 1.05/10k
De Inventione 3 · 0.91/10k
Pseudolus 1 · 0.9/10k
In L. Catilinam 1 · 0.8/10k
Aeneid 5 · 0.79/10k

Densest 12 of 29 attested works shown, by occurrences per 10,000 attested tokens.

What it meant

1. vagina — de Vaan

vagina 'sheath, scabbard' [f. a\ (Varro+) Pit *wag-ma-l If cognate with Lith. vozti 'to cover', the original meaning of vagina would be 'cover'. Obviously, this is a gratuitous proposal. Bibl.: WH II: 725, EM 711, IEW 1110, Schrijver 1991: 146, LIV *ueh2g-. valeo vagio, -ire 'to cry' [v. IV] (Enn.+) Derivatives: vagor 'loud crying' (Enn.+), vagltus, -its 'cry of distress' (Lucr.+), — [de Vaan, s.v. vagina, p. 664]

2. vāgīna — Lewis & Short

vāgīna, ae, f.cf. vas,

I a scabbard, sheath.

I Lit., of a sword, Cic. Inv. 2, 4, 14; id. Marcell. 7, 57; Caes. B. G. 5, 44; Verg. A. 4, 579; 6, 260; 10, 475; Hor. S. 2, 1, 41; Ov. M. 10, 475; Val. Max. 8, 9, 2: (delphinus) pinnae aculeos velut vagina condens, Plin. 9, 8, 8, § 25; cf. id. 8, 15, 17, § 41; 7, 52, 53, § 174; 11, 37, 77, § 198.—Trop.: senatus consultum inclusum in tabulis tamquam in vaginā reconditum habere, Cic. Cat. 1, 2, 4: ut gladius ... ita vox in vaginā silentii condita hebetatur, App. Flor. 3, p. 357, 32.—

II Transf., the covering, sheath, holder of any thing.

1 In gen.: omnia principalia viscera membranis propriis ac velut vaginis inclusit natura, Plin. 11, 37, 77, § 198; cf.: cremato eo (corpore), inimici ... remeanti animae veluti vaginam ademerint, id. 7, 52, 53, § 174.—

2 The sheath of an ear of grain, etc., the hull, husk, Varr. R. R. 1, 48, 1 sq.; Cic. Sen. 15, 51.—Cf. of a frame or mould to shape a growing gourd, Plin. 19, 5, 24, § 70.—

3 The female vagina, Plaut. Ps. 4, 7, 85.—

4 The sheath of a claw, in cats, Plin. 8, 15, 17, § 41.

3. vagina — Walde–Hofmann

vagina, -ae f. ,Schwertscheide* (Plaut. Pseud. 1181 in obszónem Sinn); „Ährenhülse* (seit Varro [vaginula „Spelthülse“ seit Plın.), rom., ebenso *-inella; spätl. Chiron — vagätiö durch Vermischung mit eagor, s. Ahlquist Stud. 131; nhd. Scheide ,weibliches Geburtsglied* ist Bed.-Lw. aus vagina, s. Kluge!! s. v.): zu lit, eóZiu, vözti „decke etwas Hohles über etwas, überstülpe“, lett. väschu, väsu, väst „lege einen … — [Walde–Hofmann, s.v. vagina, p. 1633]

In the wild

vagina Seneca, Phoenissae 1
vagina Claudian, Epithalamium de nuptiis Honorii Augusti 1.192
vaginas Pliny the Elder, Naturalis Historia 16.43.p2
vagina Ovid, Metamorphoses 6.551
vagina Cicero, Pro M. Marcello 17
vaginaque Vergil, Aeneid 10.896

6 of 47 attestations shown.

Where it came from

de Vaan, Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages (Brill 2008) Treated in de Vaan, Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages (Brill 2008) s.v. vagina (scan pp. 664-665; entry #1906). Root candidates: *ueh2g-.
Ernout-Meillet, Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue latine Treated in Ernout-Meillet, Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue latine s.v. uagina (scan p. 735; entry #12279).
Walde-Hofmann, Lateinisches etymologisches Worterbuch Treated in Walde-Hofmann, Lateinisches etymologisches Worterbuch s.v. vagina (scan p. 1633; entry #3138). Root candidates: *gägion-.

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.