tripus

English

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from Latin tripūs, from Ancient Greek τρίπους (trípous); doublet of tripod and teapoy. In the sense associated with Cambridge University, the Tripus is named after the three-legged stool on which he sat during the degree-awarding ceremony.

Pronunciation

• enPR: trīʹpəs, IPA^(key): /ˈtɹaɪpəs/

Noun

tripus (plural tripodes)

1. (obsolete, rare, in the history of Cambridge University, capitalised when used as a title) A Bachelor of Arts appointed to make satirical strictures in humorous dispute with the candidates at a degree-awarding ceremony; tripos, prevaricator.
2. (obsolete, rare) A vessel (usually a pot or cauldron) resting on three legs, often given as an ornament, a prize, or as an offering at a shrine to a god or oracle; often specifically, that such vessel upon which the priestess sat to deliver her oracles at the shrine to Apollo at Delphi; tripod.
3. (zoology, in cypriniform fishes) The hindmost Weberian ossicle of the Weberian apparatus, touching the anterior wall of the swimbladder and connected by a dense, elongate ligament to the intercalarium.

Synonyms

• (tripos, prevaricator): bachelor of the stool, prevaricator, terrae filius (equivalent at Oxford University), tripos
• (three-legged vessel in Greek and Roman antiquities): tripod
• (bone in fishes): malleus, malleus Weberi

References

• “‖tripus” listed in the Oxford English Dictionary [2^nd Ed.; 1989]
• The Century Dictionary Online
• Dictionary of Ichthyology, Brian W. Coad and Don E. McAllister
• A Dictionary of Scientific Terms, Henderson I. F., Henderson W. D., BiblioBazaar, LLC, 2009, →ISBN, →ISBN, p. 174

Anagrams

• purist, spruit, stir up, uprist, upstir

Latin

Etymology

Borrowed from Ancient Greek τρίπους (trípous).

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈtri.puːs/, [ˈt̪rɪpuːs̠]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈtri.pus/, [ˈt̪riːpus]

Noun

tripūs m (genitive tripodis); third declension

1. three-footed seat, tripod
   • (Can we clean up⁽⁺⁾ this sense?) 1531, Procopius Caesariensis, De rebus Gothorum, Persarum ac Vandalorum libri VII, page 262

     Tripus ferrea ante regiã ſemper ſtare ſolebat...

     An iron tripod always used to stand in front of the palace...

2. tripus (the tripod of the oracle at Delphi)
   • 1826, Børge Thorlacius, Vas pictum Halico-graecum quod Orestem ad tripodem Delphicum supplicem exhibet, main title (Schultz)

     Vas pictum Halico-graecum quod Orestem ad tripodem Delphicum supplicem exhibet

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

Usage notes

• In post-Classical Latin, tripūs is sometimes treated as feminine.

Declension

Third-declension noun.

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	tripūs	tripodēs
Genitive	tripodis	tripodum
Dative	tripodī	tripodibus
Accusative	tripodem	tripodēs
Ablative	tripode	tripodibus
Vocative	tripūs	tripodēs

Descendants

• → Catalan: trípode
• → English: tripod, tripus
• → Finnish: tripodi
• → French: tripode
• → Galician: trípode
• → Hungarian: tripod
• → Italian: tripode
• → Spanish: trípode

Further reading

• “tripus”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “tripus”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• tripus 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)
• “tripus”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers