Latin

Question 1

What Latin word for “bedpost” has come to refer to the axis of a very simple machine?

Answer 1

Fulcrum

Question 2

Whereas patricide is the killing of one’s father and matricide is the killing of one’s mother, and as mariticide is the killing of one’s husband, what is the corresponding Latin-derived term for the killing of one’s wife?

Answer 2

Uxoricide

Question 3

What word, derived from the Latin for “made from calf,” describes parchment of particularly good quality? Notwithstanding its animal origins, the word is sometimes used today to describe high-quality paper.

Answer 3

Vellum

Question 4

What’s the unusual English translation of the medical principle “Primum non nocere”?

Answer 4

“First, do no harm”

Question 5

The Latin word medeor – “to heal” – gives us this word for a cure.

Answer 5

Remedy

Question 6

From the Latin for “play together”, this is people working or conspiring together to commit a crime.

Answer 6

Collusion

Question 7

This is what you would call somebody who studies flags.

Answer 7

Vexillologist Vexillum = Flag (Latin)

Question 8

What English word comes from the Latin for “suffering” and matches that definition when used in certain religious and artistic contexts, but has an altogether different (and perhaps opposite) meaning when used elsewhere?

Answer 8

Passion

Question 9

This 3-word Latin phrase means “retroactively.”

Answer 9

Ex post facto

Question 10

Virgil’s “omnia vincit amor” is this saying in English about the power of the heart.

Answer 10

Love Conquers All

Question 11

Just as in literature, you can get this type of collection, from Latin for “all”, for comic books.

Answer 11

Omnibus

Question 12

For the Latin for “to look at”, they are investors out for short-term profit; their money keeps the markets liquid and efficient.

Answer 12

Speculators

Question 13

Rough elbows can benefit from this type of product that hydrates and softens, from the Latin for “soft.”

Answer 13

Emollient

Question 14

This term is derived from two Latin words which together mean “suffer the opposite.” It refers to the punishment of souls in Dante’s Inferno, in which they suffer in a way that either resembles or is contrary to the sin itself.

Answer 14

Contrapasso

Question 15

From the Latin for “blood”, this word can either mean “cheerful” or “bloodthirsty.”

Answer 15

Sanguine

Question 16

After the Gallic Wars, when Caesar felt he did not receive the military honors owed to him by the Senate, Caesar crossed the Rubicon River, uttering the phrase “alea iacta est” which means what?

Answer 16

The die has been cast

Question 17

This term, derived from the Latin word for clan or tribe, is an ethnonym that commonly means non-Jew.

Answer 17

Gentile

Question 18

This two-word Latin term is most often used to describe a practice or document that is provided as a courtesy or meets minimum requirements, conforms to a norm/doctrine, tends to be performed perfunctorily or is considered a formality.

Answer 18

Pro forma

Question 19

This Latin phrase means “mode of living” or “way of life,” and is used to describe an arrangement that allows conflicting parties to coexist.

Answer 19

Modus Vivendi

Question 20

From the Latin for “let it be printed,” this term refers to the acceptance that or guarantee that something is of good standard. It more specifically refers to an official license by the Catholic Church to print an ecclesiastical or religious book.

Answer 20

Imprimatur

Question 21

Intestinal or not, this cardinal virtue comes from Latin for “strength.”

Answer 21

Fortitude

Question 22

Yale’s motto “Lux et Veritas” means this.

Answer 22

Light and Truth

Question 23

These two Latin words are used to describe the front and back side of a page, respectively.

Answer 23

Recto, Verso

Question 24

This Latin phrase is used to indicate that a book comes from somebody or somewhere’s collection.

Answer 24

Ex Libris

Question 25

In Latin if something is happening “januis clausis”, it’s happening here.

Answer 25

Behind closed doors

Question 26

What adjective, from the Latin for “twilight,” describes the heavenly rays seen in this image?

Answer 26

Crepuscular

Question 27

This Latin sequence, whose title translates to “Day of Wrath,” dates back to the thirteenth century and is best known for its use in the Requiem (a Catholic service for deceased persons).

Answer 27

Dies Irae

Question 28

What three-word Latin phrase, which first appeared in French as “je pense, donc je suis” in René Descartes Discours de la Méthode from 1637, appeared later in his 1644 book Principia Philosophiae(“Principles of Philosophy”)?

Answer 28

Cogito, Ergo Sum

Question 29

This is a Latin term for the third name held by a citizen of Ancient Rome. Initially it was meant to serve as a nickname but it lost that purpose when it became hereditary. The most notable use of this name was to distinguish individuals for accomplishing great feats, often military.

Answer 29

Cognomen

Question 30

What word from criminal law comes is borrowed from a Latin adverb meaning “elsewhere”?

Answer 30

Alibi

Question 31

In Latin, plural nouns in the first declension (which are mainly feminine) and in the nominative case (usually the subject of a verb) typically end with what two letters?

Answer 31

AE

Question 32

This word meaning given to quick and unpredictable mood changes goes back to the Roman messenger god.

Answer 32

Mercurial

Question 33

From the name of Rome’s top god, it means “full of good cheer”

Answer 33

Jovial

Question 34

The Latin word for “trumpet” is, in English, a different but related musical instrument. What is that instrument?

Answer 34

Tuba

Question 35

From the Latin for “elsewhere”, it’s proof that you were elsewhere when a crime was committed.

Answer 35

Alibi

Question 36

5-letter word for one who follows the rituals of a polytheistic religion, or perhaps no religion at all.

Answer 36

Pagan

Question 37

In Latin it means “let it be done”; in English it’s an arbitrary ruling; in Italy it’s a car.

Answer 37

Fiat

Question 38

What is the third and final item in the set of Latin-derived calendrical terms that begins with the kalends and the nones?

Answer 38

Ides

Question 39

The Latin name for a particular ancient city is, by coincidence, also the anatomical name for the largest part of the hip bone. What is that name?

Answer 39

Ilium (Troy)

Question 40

What English word, borrowed directly from Latin and very common in physics and particularly in its namesake branch of physics, can be defined as a discrete, indivisible manifestation of a physical property?

Answer 40

Quantum

Question 41

Homo sapiens means “man the” this 4-letter word.

Answer 41

Wise

Question 42

This adjective for your mixed feelings comes from Latin for “both” & “vigor”

Answer 42

Ambivalent

Question 43

Before it was used for a musical work, this 4-letter word meaning “work” was used by the Romans to designate construction.

Answer 43

Opus

Question 44

What word, from the Latin for “not any”, is defined in a legal sense as having no binding force, and in mathematics is associated with the value or concept of zero?

Answer 44

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