scortillum

Latin

Etymology

From scortum (“hide, skin; whore, prostitute”) +‎ -illum (suffix forming diminutives).

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [skɔrˈtɪl.lũː]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [skorˈtil.lum]

Noun

scortillum n (genitive scortillī); second declension

1. little whore (a young, small, inexperienced, cute, or unesteemed prostitute)
   • c. 84 BCE – 54 BCE, Catullus, Carmina 10.3:

     scortillum, ut mihi tum repente vīsum est […]

     A little whore, as it then immediately seemed to me, […]

   • 1719, William Musgrave, Antiquitates Britanno-Belgicae..., Vol. I, Cap. XII, § I:

     Prima Venerem repraesentat. Tam eximia fuit, tamque praeclara Veneris forma, quae illam Cinyrae, Regi Cyprio, cujus Scortillum erat, commendaret...

     The first [statue] displays Venus. So exceptional and so renowned was the body of Venus, which presumably commended her to Cinyras, the Cyprian’s king, whose little Whore she was...

2. little slut (a young, small, inexperienced, cute, or unesteemed sexually active woman)

Declension

Second-declension noun (neuter).

	singular	plural
nominative	scortillum	scortilla
genitive	scortillī	scortillōrum
dative	scortillō	scortillīs
accusative	scortillum	scortilla
ablative	scortillō	scortillīs
vocative	scortillum	scortilla

Further reading

• “scortillum”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “scortillum”, in Gaffiot, Félix (1934), Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.