phalanga

Latin

Alternative forms

• falanga, palanga (manuscript variants)
• palanca, planca

Etymology

Borrowed from Ancient Greek φᾰ́λᾰγγᾰ (phálanga), the accusative singular form of φάλαγξ (phálanx). Compare phalanx.

Noun

phalanga f (genitive phalangae); first declension

1. wooden roller (for moving ships or military engines)
2. carrying pole
3. alternative form of phalanx (“battalion”)

Declension

First-declension noun.

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	phalanga	phalangae
Genitive	phalangae	phalangārum
Dative	phalangae	phalangīs
Accusative	phalangam	phalangās
Ablative	phalangā	phalangīs
Vocative	phalanga	phalangae

Descendants

• Romanian: părângă
• Italian: palanca (“board”)
  • → Alemannic German: Palangge
• Italian: paranco (“hoist”), palanco
  • → French: palan
    • Vietnamese: pa lăng
  • → Ottoman Turkish: پلانقه (palanka, “block-and-tackle”)
    • Turkish: palanga
• Franco-Provençal: planche, palanche, pilanche
  • → French: palanche
• >? Old French: planche (“plank”), planke, planque
  • Anglo-Norman: planke (see there for further descendants)
  • French: planche (see there for further descendants)
  • Norman: plianche
• Old Occitan:
  • Old Catalan: palanca, planca
    • Catalan: palanca (“gangplank, lever, diving-board”)
  • Occitan: plaunca
• Sardinian: palanga
• West Iberian
  • Asturian: llancha (“small boat”)
  • Old Galician-Portuguese: *paanca
    • Galician: panca (“lever, shaft”)
    • Portuguese: panca (“lever”)
  • Old Spanish: palanca
    • Spanish: palanca (“lever, handle”)
• →? Albanian: pleng (“heavy object”)
• → Italian: falanga
• → Polish: falanga

References

• phalanga 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)
• “phalanga”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “phalanga” in volume 10.1.2, column 1994, line 9 in the Thesaurus Linguae Latinae (TLL Open Access), Berlin (formerly Leipzig): De Gruyter (formerly Teubner), 1900–present