spadix

Via Latin spādīx from Ancient Greek σπᾱ́δῑξ (spā́dīx, “palm branch”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈspeɪdɪks/
• Rhymes: -eɪdɪks

spadix (plural spadixes or spadices)

1. (botany) A fleshy spike (inflorescence) with reduced flowers, usually enclosed by a spathe, characteristic of aroids.
   • 1789, Erasmus Darwin, The Loves of the Plants, J. Johnson, page 148:

     The spadix of this plant is frequently quite white, or coloured, and the leaves liable to be streaked with white, and to have black, or scarlet blotches on them.

2. (zoology) A male sexual organ of certain cephalopods and hydrozoans (especially the nautilus), used to transfer sperm.
   • 2017, Danna Staaf, Squid Empire, ForeEdge, →ISBN, page 57:

     However, the shells of modern nautiluses show the opposite pattern—males are somewhat larger than females, with a wider aperture to accommodate the spadix.

• spadiceous

• Araceae
• spathe

Borrowed from Ancient Greek σπᾱ́δῑξ (spā́dīx).

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ˈspaː.diːks]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [ˈspaː.diks]

spādīx m (genitive spādīcis); third declension

1. spadix, inflorescence (especially of a palm tree)
2. a type of lyre

Third-declension noun (Greek-type, normal variant).

spādīx (genitive spādīcis); third-declension one-termination adjective

1. red like dates on a branch, spadiceous

• All Roman commentaries on this color term are connected to the explication of a passage of Vergil about horses.
• Marcus Fronto, as told by Aulus Gellius, explained the color as being proper to dates on a palm branch before they are fully "cooked" by the sun, and gave pūniceus and rutilus as synonyms of it, and also added that the color is shining and rich.
• Later commentaries on the color term in Vergil fix it as a brownish color that horses may have, explicitly different from pūniceus by a change of degree. It may be speculated that something of the poetic license was lost in these didactic commentaries.

The declension type may not be established from evidence. It may have been Greek-type as used by Vergil. In that case the attested nominative plural would have been spādīces instead of spādīcēs. The table below follows a small version of this assumption.

Third-declension Greek-type one-termination adjective (non-i-stem)

• “spadix”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “spadix”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891), An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “spadix”, in Gaffiot, Félix (1934), Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.

spadix n (plural spadice)

1. alternative form of spadice