crabro

Possibly from Proto-Italic *krāzrō, from Proto-Indo-European *ḱerh₂-. Cognate with Proto-Slavic *sьrxy, Old High German hornaz, hornuz, horniz (“hornet”), Old English hurnitu, hyrnetu (“hornet”). More at hornet.

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ˈkraː.broː]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [ˈkraː.bro]

crābrō m (genitive crābrōnis); third declension

1. hornet
   • 8 CE, Ovid, Fasti 3.753–754:

     Mīlia crābrōnum coeunt et vertice nūdō
     spīculā dēfīgunt ōraque sīma notant.

     Thousands of hornets unite and thrust their stings into the top of his bald head and mark his snub-nosed face.
     (When Silenus goes looking for honey he is attacked by hornets.)

Third-declension noun.

Most descendants via crābrōnem (accusative).

• Italy:
  • Italian: calabrone
  • Lombard: gravalòn
  • Venetan: graón, gravarón, graùgn
• Iberia:
  • Portuguese: cambrão
  • Spanish: cambrón
• Borrowings:
  • → Esperanto: krabro
  • → Portuguese: crabro
  • → Spanish: crabrón

• “crabro”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “crabro”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• crabro in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.