nutrix

Latin

Alternative forms

• noutrix (archaic inscription, CIL 1.45)

Etymology

From earlier *noutrītrīx, from Proto-Italic *snoutrītrīks, equivalent to nūtriō (“to suckle”) +‎ -trīx (“feminine agent-noun suffix”), with haplology simplifying -trītrī- to -trī-.

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈnuː.triːks/, [ˈnuːt̪riːks̠]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈnu.triks/, [ˈnuːt̪riks]

Noun

nūtrīx f (genitive nūtrīcis); third declension

1. a child's nurse; wet nurse; milk mother
   • 8 CE, Ovid, Fasti 2.422:

     magna datī nūtrīx praemia lactis habet

     [How] great the rewards of the milk the wet nurse gave.
     (The she-wolf nurses the twins Romulus and Remus. See wet nurse.)

2. (transferred sense) (anything that provides nutriment and support)
3. (figuratively) (that which rears, originates, promotes or fosters)

Declension

Third-declension noun.

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	nūtrīx	nūtrīcēs
Genitive	nūtrīcis	nūtrīcum
Dative	nūtrīcī	nūtrīcibus
Accusative	nūtrīcem	nūtrīcēs
Ablative	nūtrīce	nūtrīcibus
Vocative	nūtrīx	nūtrīcēs

Derived terms

• nūtrīcius

Descendants

• Italian: nodrice
• Old Spanish: nodriz
• → Italian: nutrice
• → Old Spanish: nutriz

References

• “nūtrix” on page 1330 of the Oxford Latin Dictionary (2nd ed., 2012)
• Walther von Wartburg (1928–2002) “nŭtrīcia”, in Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch (in German), volumes 7: N–Pas, page 248
• “nutrix”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “nutrix”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• nutrix in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
• nutrix in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• Carl Meißner, Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book‎^[1], London: Macmillan and Co.
  • to imbibe error from one's mother's breasts: errorem cum lacte nutricis sugere (Tusc. 3. 1. 2)