cloaca

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin cloāca (“sewer”), from cluō (“cleanse; purge”).^[1]

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /kləʊˈeɪkə/
• (US) IPA^(key): /kloʊˈeɪkə/
• Rhymes: -eɪkə

Noun

cloaca (plural cloacas or cloacae)

1. A sewer (also in figurative senses).
   • 1773, Gentleman's Magazine, No. 43, p. 598:

     The Thames, polluted with the filthy effusions of the cloacae.

   • 1850, Thomas Carlyle, Latter-day Pamphlets, Ch. iv, p. 46:
   • ...that tremendous cloaca of Pauperism...
2. (zoology) The duct in reptiles, amphibians and birds, as well as most fish and some mammals, which serves as the common outlet for urination, defecation, and reproduction.
   • 1822, John Mason Good, The Study of Medicine, Vol. I, p. 7:

     In birds the rectum, at the termination of its canal, forms an oval or elongated pouch... and then expands into a cavity, which has been named cloaca.

3. An outhouse or lavatory.
   • 1840, Frederick Marryat, Olla Podrida, Ch. xxiv:

     To every house... a cloaca.

4. (anatomy) A duct through which gangrenous material escapes a body.
   • 1846, Frederick Brittan translating Joseph François Malgaigne as Manual of Operative Surgery, p. 172

     Across this shell [sc. of bone] small holes are eaten, by which the matter escapes, and which are called cloacae (Weidmann).

References

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin cloaca. Cognate to the inherited doublet chiavica.

Noun

cloaca f (plural cloache)

1. sewer
2. cesspit, cesspool
3. (anatomy) cloaca

Etymology

From cluō (“cleanse”).

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /kloˈaː.ka/

Noun

cloāca f (genitive cloācae); first declension

1. A sewer or underground drain
2. (humorous) The stomach of a drunken or voracious woman

References

• cloaca in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• cloaca in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• cloaca in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition, 1883–1887)
• cloaca in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898) Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• cloaca in William Smith et al., editor (1890) A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, London: William Wayte. G. E. Marindin

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin cloaca.

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -aka

Noun

cloaca f (plural cloacas)

1. (anatomy) cloaca (excretory and genital duct in bird, reptiles and fish)

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin cloāca (“sewer”), from cluō (“cleanse”).

Noun

cloaca f (plural cloacas)

1. sewer, storm drain
2. (zoology) cloaca