latifundium

English

Etymology

From Latin lātifundium, from lātus (“wide, extensive”) + fundus (“ground, base, estate, farm”).

Noun

latifundium (plural latifundia)

1. A great landed estate with absentee ownership and labor often in a state of partial servitude.
   • 2011, Will Self, "The frowniest spot on Earth", London Review of Books, XXXIII.9:

     His vision for the future of the African continent in the Age of the Aerotropolis seems to be as a vast latifundium sown with GM wheat.

Related terms

• latifundial

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Latin

Etymology

From lātus (“wide”) + fundus (“ground, farm”).

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /laː.tiˈfun.di.um/, [ɫ̪äːt̪ɪˈfʊn̪d̪iʊ̃ˑ]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /la.tiˈfun.di.um/, [lät̪iˈfun̪d̪ium]

Noun

lātifundium n (genitive lātifundiī or lātifundī); second declension

1. great landed estate, large farm

Declension

Second-declension noun (neuter).

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	lātifundium	lātifundia
Genitive	lātifundiī lātifundī1	lātifundiōrum
Dative	lātifundiō	lātifundiīs
Accusative	lātifundium	lātifundia
Ablative	lātifundiō	lātifundiīs
Vocative	lātifundium	lātifundia

¹Found in older Latin (until the Augustan Age).

Descendants

• English: latifundium
• Hebrew: לטיפונדיה (latifundia)
• Italian: latifondo

• Portuguese: latifúndio
• Romanian: latifundiu
• Spanish: latifundio

References

• “latifundium”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• latifundium in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• “latifundium”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers