cicatrix

English

Etymology

From Latin cicatrix.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /ˈsɪ.kəˌtɹɪks/, /sɪˈkeɪ.tɹɪks/
• Hyphenation: ci‧ca‧trix

Noun

cicatrix (plural cicatrixes or cicatrices)

1. A scar that remains after the development of new tissue over a recovering wound or sore (also used figuratively).
   • 1853, John C. Cobden, The White Slaves of England, Cincinnati: Derby, page 33:

     Here the boy was made to strip, and the commissioner, Mr Symonds, found a large cicatrix likely to have been occasioned by such an instrument...

   • 1938, Xavier Herbert, chapter II, in Capricornia, page 21:

     He stopped to stare at two old men who sat beside the fire, naked and daubed with red and white ochre and adorned about arms and legs and breasts with elaborate systems of cicatrix.

   • 2011, Diane Duane, chapter 13, in Stealing the Elf-King's Roses: The Author's Cut:

     Past the mountains, Ellay now lay looking scratchy and scarred, a hatchmarked cicatrix on the dusty earth, livid in the threatening light.

Derived terms

• cicatricial
• cicatrize

Translations

scar that remains after the development of new tissue — see also scar

• Spanish: cicatriz (es) f

Latin

Etymology

Unknown etymology, possibly from a substrate.

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [kɪˈkaː.triːks]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [t͡ʃiˈkaː.triks]

Noun

cicātrīx f (genitive cicātrīcis); third declension

1. scar
   • c. 4 BCE – 65 CE, Seneca Minor, Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium 1.2.3:

     Nihil aequē sānitātem impedit quam remediōrum crēbra mūtātiō; nōn venit vulnus ad cicātrīcem in quō medicāmenta temptantur.

     Nothing hinders recovery so much as frequent changes of remedies; a wound does not form into a scar when [varied] drugs are tried.
     (In other words, such a wound will not heal.)

Declension

Third-declension noun.

	singular	plural
nominative	cicātrīx	cicātrīcēs
genitive	cicātrīcis	cicātrīcum
dative	cicātrīcī	cicātrīcibus
accusative	cicātrīcem	cicātrīcēs
ablative	cicātrīce	cicātrīcibus
vocative	cicātrīx	cicātrīcēs

Derived terms

• cicātrīcula
• cicātrīcor
• cicātrīcōsus

Descendants

• → English: cicatrix, cicatrice
• Catalan: cicatriu
• → Esperanto: cikatro
• French: cicatrice
• Galician: cicatriz
• Italian: cicatrice
• Portuguese: cicatriz
• Romanian: cicatrice
• Spanish: cicatriz

References

• “cicatrix”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “cicatrix”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891), An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “cicatrix”, in Gaffiot, Félix (1934), Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• Carl Meißner; Henry William Auden (1894), Latin Phrase-Book‎^[1], London: Macmillan and Co.
  • wounds (scars) on the breast: vulnera (cicatrices) adversa (opp. aversa)
    
  • to open an old wound: refricare vulnus, cicatricem obductam