Hello, you have come here looking for the meaning of the word plectrum. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word plectrum, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say plectrum in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word plectrum you have here. The definition of the word plectrum will help you to be more precise and correct when speaking or writing your texts. Knowing the definition ofplectrum, as well as those of other words, enriches your vocabulary and provides you with more and better linguistic resources.
Borrowed from Latinplēctrum, from Ancient Greekπλῆκτρον(plêktron, “anything to strike with, an instrument for striking the lyre, a spear point”), from πλήσσειν(plḗssein, “to strike, to smite, to sting”).
For sounds in winter nights, and often in winter days, I heard the forlorn but melodious note of a hooting owl indefinitely far; such a sound as the frozen earth would yield if struck with a suitable plectrum, the very lingua vernacula of Walden Wood, and quite familiar to me at last, though I never saw the bird while it was making it.
“plectrum”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
plectrum 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)
plectrum in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
“plectrum”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
“plectrum”, in William Smith et al., editor (1890), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, London: William Wayte. G. E. Marindin
