English

An incunabulum.

Noun

incunabulum ‎(plural incunabula)

1. A book, single sheet, or image that was printed — not handwritten — before the year 1501 in Europe.
   • 2004, Luisa Graves (translator), Carlos Ruiz Zafón (author), The Shadow of the Wind,

     Something about him reminded me of one of those figures from old-fashioned playing cards or the sort used by fortune-tellers, a print straight from the pages of an incunabulum: his presence was both funereal and incandescent, like a curse dressed in its Sunday best.

Usage notes

• This word is better known, and more widely used, in its plural form, incunabula.

Related terms

• incunable
• incunabular
• incunabulist

Translations

References

• Incunabula Collections, The British Library
• Weird Words

Latin

Etymology

From in- +‎ cūnābulum.

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /in.kuːˈnaː.bu.lum/, [ɪŋ.kuːˈnaː.bʊ.ɫũ]
• (Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /in.kuˈna.bu.lum/, [iŋ.kuˈnaː.bu.lum]

Noun

incūnābulum n ‎(genitive incūnābulī); second declension

1. (chiefly in the plural) the apparatus of the cradle;
2. birthplace, origin

Inflection

Second declension.

References

• Meissner, Carl; Auden, Henry William (1894) Latin Phrase-Book, London: Macmillan and Co.
  • (ambiguous) the origin, first beginnings of learning: incunabula doctrinae