arx

Latin

Etymology

(deprecated template usage)

From Proto-Indo-European *h₂erk-. Cognates include Latin arca (“chest, box”), arceō (“I defend”), arcānus (“hidden, secret”), arcera (“kind of wagon”), Old Armenian արգել (argel, “obstacle”) and Ancient Greek ἀρκέω (arkéō).

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /arks/, [ärks̠]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /arks/, [ärks]

Noun

arx f (genitive arcis); third declension

1. citadel, stronghold, fortress
   • Vergil, Aeneid, 2.56:

     ... Trōiaque, nunc stārēs, Priamīque arx alta, manērēs.

     ... and Troy, you would now be standing, and Priam's mighty citadel still endure.

2. height, summit, hilltop; the Capitoline hill
3. defense, refuge
4. (figuratively) bulwark

Declension

Third-declension noun (i-stem).

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	arx	arcēs
Genitive	arcis	arcium
Dative	arcī	arcibus
Accusative	arcem	arcēs arcīs
Ablative	arce	arcibus
Vocative	arx	arcēs

References

• “arx”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “arx”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• arx 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)
• arx in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• “arx”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “arx”, in Samuel Ball Platner (1929) Thomas Ashby, editor, A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome, London: Oxford University Press
• “arx”, in William Smith et al., editor (1890), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, London: William Wayte. G. E. Marindin