ligula

From Latin ligula (“strap, spoon”), a variant of lingula (“small tongue-shaped object”), itself partly derived from lingō (“lick”) and partly a diminutive of lingua (“tongue”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈlɪɡ.jʊ.lə/

ligula (plural ligulas or ligulae)

1. A strap or strap-shaped object, especially such a development in plants or insects.
   • 1974, Guy Davenport, Tatlin!:

     He unhasped the ligulae of his haversack, taking out a pair of blue jeans which he tossed to Bruno.

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

ligula

1. alternative form of lingula (“tongue or tongue-shaped thing”)
   • 38 CE – 104 CE, Martial, Epigraph 120:

     Quamvis me ligulam dicant equitesque patresque,
     dicor ab indoctis lingula grammaticis.

     Though knights (the equites, an equestrian aristocratic order) and senators call me ligula,
     I am called lingula by stolid and ignorant grammarians.

First-declension noun.

• “ligula”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press