equitatus

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /e.kʷiˈtaː.tus/,
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /e.kwiˈta.tus/,

From equitō (“to ride”) +‎ -tus (noun-forming suffix).

equitātus m (genitive equitātūs); fourth declension

1. cavalry
2. an instance of riding
3. (rare) the order of equestrians

Fourth-declension noun.

• (riding): equitātiō

Apparently from equiō, equīre (“I am on heat”) via an unused frequentative *equitō +‎ -tus (noun-forming suffix).^[1]

equitātus m (genitive equitātūs); fourth declension

1. (of mares) a being in heat
   • c. 165 BCE – 103 BCE, Gaius Lucilius, Saturae (fragments) 1275:

     quantum hinnitum atque equitatum

   • 116 BCE – 27 BCE, Marcus Terentius Varro, De Lingua Latina 7.104:

     Lucilii: 'haec inquam rudet ex rostris atque hei<u>litabit.' eiusdem: 'quantum hinnitum atque equitatum.'

     • 1938 translation by Roland G. Kent

       Lucilius's
       This, I say, he'll bray from the stand and lament
       to the public.
       The same poet's
       How much neighing and prancing like horses.

Fourth-declension noun.

• “equitatus”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “equitatus”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• equitatus 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)
• equitatus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• Carl Meißner, Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book‎, London: Macmillan and Co.
  • to have the advantage in cavalry: equitatu superiorem esse
    
  • the cavalry covers the retreat: equitatus tutum receptum dat
    
• “equitātus” in volume 5, part 3, column 728, line 55 in the Thesaurus Linguae Latinae (TLL Open Access), Berlin (formerly Leipzig): De Gruyter (formerly Teubner), 1900–present