pistillum

== English == === Etymology === From Latin pistillum. Doublet of pestle and pistil. === Noun === pistillum (plural pistilla) (botany, obsolete) A pistil. == Latin == === Etymology === A diminutive formation from the root of pīnsō and pistō. Perhaps from *pistlelo-, diminutive of *pistlo- (the ancestor of pīlum (“pounder, pestle”)), from *pis- and the instrument noun suffix *tlo-. Alternatively from *pistrelo-, with the -tr- variant of the instrument noun suffix. On the one hand, the base *pistrum is not attested, and the phonetically regular outcome of *pistrelo- would probably be pistellum rather than pistillum. On the other hand, reconstructing a *-s-tl- sequence in the base at the time the diminutive was derived is chronologically problematic since *-tl- was changed to *-kl-* from early on in Italic (as seen in the Latin instrument suffix -culum). === Pronunciation === (Classical Latin) IPA(key): [pɪsˈtɪl.lũː] (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA(key): [pisˈtil.lum] === Noun === pistillum n (genitive pistillī); second declension A pestle. ==== Declension ==== Second-declension noun (neuter). ==== Descendants ==== Italian: pestello Old French: pestel→ Middle English: pestel, pestell, pistel, pestelle, pestylle, pestill, pestylEnglish: pestleMiddle French: pestel Old Occitan: pestel → English: pistillum → French: pistil→ English: pistil→ Romanian: pistil → Italian: pistillo → Spanish: pistilo === References === === Further reading === “pistillum”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press “pistillum”, in Gaffiot, Félix (1934), Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette. “pistillum”, in William Smith et al., editor (1890), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, London: William Wayte. G. E. Marindin