flagellate

English

Etymology

Latin flagellum (“whip”)

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -ɛlət

Verb

flagellate (third-person singular simple present flagellates, present participle flagellating, simple past and past participle flagellated)

1. (transitive) To whip or scourge.
2. (transitive) Of a spermatozoon, to move its tail back and forth.
   • 1981, William Irwin Thompson, The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality and the Origins of Culture, London: Rider/Hutchinson & Co., page 63:

     The gigantic egg sits, and the frantic and tiny sperm flagellates its tail to cross vast distances on its quest for dissolution in the huge egg.

Translations

to whip or scourge

• Bulgarian: бичувам (bg) (bičuvam)
• Catalan: flagel·lar (ca)
• Esperanto: skurĝi
• Finnish: piiskata (fi)
• Italian: flagelare
• Quechua: asut'iy
• Russian: поро́ть (ru) (porótʹ), (dated, now means "chastise") бичева́ть (ru) (bičevátʹ)
• Spanish: flagelar (es)
• Swedish: flagellera, piska (sv), gissla (sv)

Adjective

flagellate (comparative more flagellate, superlative most flagellate)

1. Resembling a whip.
2. (biology) Having flagella.

Derived terms

• biflagellate
• flagellation
• triflagellate

Related terms

• flagellum

Translations

resembling a whip

• Finnish: piiskamainen

biology: having flagella

• Bulgarian: камшичест (kamšičest)
• Catalan: flagel·lar (ca)
• Finnish: siima- (fi)

Noun

flagellate (plural flagellates)

1. (biology) Any organism that has flagella.

Translations

organism with flagella

• Finnish: siimaeliö (fi)
• German: Geißeltierchen n
• Italian: flagellato (it)
• Vietnamese: trùng roi

Italian

Etymology 1

Verb

flagellate

1. inflection of flagellare:
   1. second-person plural present indicative
   2. second-person plural imperative

Etymology 2

Participle

flagellate f pl

1. feminine plural of flagellato

Latin

Verb

flagellāte

1. second-person plural present active imperative of flagellō