calculus

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English[edit]

Etymology[edit]

Pronunciation[edit]

Noun[edit]

calculus (countable and uncountable, plural calculi or calculuses)

  1. (dated, countable) Calculation; computation.
  2. (countable, mathematics) Any formal system in which symbolic expressions are manipulated according to fixed rules.
    lambda calculus
    predicate calculus
  3. (uncountable, often definite, the calculus) Differential calculus and integral calculus considered as a single subject; analysis.
  4. (countable, medicine) A stony concretion that forms in a bodily organ.
    Synonym: stone
    Hyponyms: kidney stone, nephrolith, gallstone, cholelith, sialolith, urolith
    • 2015, Jaime Samour, Avian Medicine, page 297:
      Commonly indicated for treatment of sour crop (Fig. 11-11, A), an ingluviotomy is done to retrieve crop calculi, ingluvioliths, or foreign bodies (which are not accessible per os) or to retrieve proventricular or ventricular foreign bodies (using micromagnets [glued in place within plastic tubes], lavage, or endoscopy) and for the placement of an ingluviotomy or proventriculotomy tube or the collection of crop wall biopsies.
  5. (uncountable, dentistry) Deposits of calcium phosphate salts on teeth.
  6. (countable) A decision-making method, especially one appropriate for a specialised realm.
    • 2008 December 16, “Cameron calls for bankers’ ‘day of reckoning’”, in Financial Times:
      The Tory leader refused to state how many financiers he thought should end up in jail, saying: “There is not some simple calculus."

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Latin[edit]

Etymology[edit]

From calx, calcis (limestone, game counter) +‎ -ulus (diminutive suffix).

Pronunciation[edit]

Noun[edit]

calculus m (genitive calculī); second declension

  1. diminutive of calx
  2. pebble, stone
  3. reckoning, calculating, calculation
  4. a piece in the latrunculi game

Declension[edit]

Second-declension noun.

Case Singular Plural
Nominative calculus calculī
Genitive calculī calculōrum
Dative calculō calculīs
Accusative calculum calculōs
Ablative calculō calculīs
Vocative calcule calculī

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References[edit]

  • calculus”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  • calculus”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
  • calculus 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)
  • calculus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette
  • Carl Meißner; Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book[1], London: Macmillan and Co.
    • to go through accounts, make a valuation of a thing: ad calculos vocare aliquid (Amic. 16. 58)