bivium

English

Etymology

From Latin bivium (“a place with two ways”).

Noun

bivium (plural bivia)

1. (zoology) One side of an echinoderm, including a pair of ambulacra, in distinction from the opposite side (trivium), which includes three ambulacra.

Derived terms

• bivial

Related terms

• bivious

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “bivium”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)

Latin

Etymology

Substantive from bivius (“having two ways”), which is derived from via (“path, road”).

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈbi.u̯i.um/, [ˈbiu̯iʊ̃ˑ]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈbi.vi.um/, [ˈbiːvium]

Noun

bivium n (genitive biviī or bivī); second declension

1. A place with or where two ways meet; fork in the road, crossroad.
2. A pair of alternative means or methods.

Declension

Second-declension noun (neuter).

	singular	plural
nominative	bivium	bivia
genitive	biviī bivī1	biviōrum
dative	biviō	biviīs
accusative	bivium	bivia
ablative	biviō	biviīs
vocative	bivium	bivia

¹Found in older Latin (until the Augustan Age).

Descendants

• Italian: bivio

References

• bivium in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• Carl Meißner, Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book‎^[1], London: Macmillan and Co.
  • Hercules at the cross-roads, between virtue and vice: Hercules in trivio, in bivio, in compitis
    
• “bivium”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers