cervix

Borrowed from Latin cervīx (“neck”), see below.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈsɜː.vɪks/

• Audio (UK)

  (file)

• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈsɝ.vɪks/

cervix (plural cervixes or cervices)

1. (anatomy) The neck
2. The necklike portion of any part, as of the womb.
3. The lower, narrow portion of the uterus where it joins with the top end of the vagina.

• cervical
• cervix uteri
• paracervix

Borrowed from Latin cervīx, see below.

• IPA^(key): /ˈsɛr.vɪks/

• Audio

  (file)

• Hyphenation: cer‧vix

cervix m (plural cervixen or cervices, diminutive cervixje n)

1. neck
2. The cervix between the uterus and the vagina.

• (neck): nek, hals
• (uterus portion): baarmoederhals

• cervicaal

From Proto-Indo-European *ḱerh₂- (“the head”) (compare cerebrum) and *weyk- (“to curve, bend”) (compare vinciō), literally “where the head turns”.

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈker.u̯iːks/, [ˈkɛru̯iːks̠]
• (Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈt͡ʃer.viks/, [ˈt͡ʃɛrviks]

cervīx f (genitive cervīcis); third declension

1. (anatomy, zootomy) neck, nape

   Synonym: collum

   • 8 CE, Ovid, Fasti 4.415-416:

     apta iugō cervīx nōn est feriendā secūrī:
     vīvat et in dūrā saepe labōret humō.

     The neck suitable for the yoke should not be struck by the axe:
     may it live long and labor often in the hard soil.
     (Agriculture dawns as Ceres teaches humans to yoke oxen to the plow and instead use other animals for sacrificial rites. See Ceres (mythology).)

2. (figuratively)
   1. great burden, danger (from the figure taken from bearing the yoke)
   2. boldness, headstrong behavior
3. (transferred sense) (of an object) neck

‘...levis odorato cervix manabit olivo, et feries nudos veste fluente pedes’- Propertius 3.17

Note: Often used in the plural with singular meaning.

• 44 BCE – 43 BCE, Cicero, Philippics :

  Consules designati negabant se audere in senatum venire; patriae liberatores urbe carebant ea, cuius a cervicibus iugum servile deiecerant.

  The consuls-elect said they did not dare attend the senate. The liberators of their native land were parted from the very city from whose neck they had cast off the yoke of slavery.

Third-declension noun.

• “cervix”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “cervix”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• cervix 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)
• cervix in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette
• Carl Meißner; Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book‎, London: Macmillan and Co.
  • to break a person's neck: cervices (in Cic. only in plur.) frangere alicui or alicuius
    
  • a sword hangs over his neck: gladius cervicibus impendet
    
  • the foe is at our heels, is upon us: hostis in cervicibus alicuius est
    
  • to shake off the yoke of slavery: iugum servile a cervicibus deicere (Phil. 1. 2. 6)
    
• Walther von Wartburg (1928–2002), “cervīx”, in Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch (in German), volume 2: C Q K, page 613

From French cérvix.

cervix n (uncountable)

1. cervix