cuniculus

Borrowed from Latin cunīculus.

cuniculus (plural cuniculi)

1. a burrow or low underground passage
2. a burrow in the skin made by a mite

• cuniculum, cuniclus, cunicolus, coniculus, conicolus

From Ancient Greek κόνικλος (kóniklos), probably of Iberian or Celtiberian origin; compare Basque untxi (“rabbit”), Mozarabic conchair (“greyhound”). The original meaning “burrow” adapted to the rabbit or vice versa.

Attested beginning from Cicero and Varro.

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /kuˈniː.ku.lus/, [kʊˈniːkʊɫ̪ʊs̠]
• (Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /kuˈni.ku.lus/, [kuˈniːkulus]

cunīculus m (genitive cunīculī); second declension

1. a rabbit
2. a rabbit burrow
3. a mine, underground tunnel or gallery
   • 2015, Tuomo Pekkanen, Nuntii Latini 7.8.2015:https://areena.yle.fi/1-2864830

     Greges migratorum, qui diversis viis ex Africa vel Asia in Europam venerunt, in proximitatem urbis Caleti (Calais) convenerunt, unde brevissima est in Britanniam per cuniculum traiectio.

     Groups of migrants, coming into Europe by various routes from Africa and Asia, came together near the city of Calais, where it is but a short passage to Britain through the tunnel.

Second-declension noun.

• cunīculārium

• Latin: cunīclus (see there for further descendants)
• → English: cuniculus
• → Italian: cunicolo
• → Portuguese: cunículo

• cuneus
• cunnus

• “cunīculus” in the Thesaurus Linguae Latinae (TLL Open Access), Berlin (formerly Leipzig): De Gruyter (formerly Teubner), 1900–present

• “cuniculus”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “cuniculus”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• cuniculus in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
• cuniculus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette
• Carl Meißner; Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book‎, London: Macmillan and Co.
  • to make mines, subterraneous passages: cuniculos agere (B. G. 3. 21)
    
• “cuniculus”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898) Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “cuniculus”, in William Smith et al., editor (1890) A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, London: William Wayte. G. E. Marindin