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LATIN · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

urna.

pot; cinerary urn; urn used for drawing lots; voting urn; water jar, ~13 liters;

4 characters2 syllables approx.Latina language

Meaning & usage

noun[ˈʊr.na]Classical-Latin[ˈur.na]
  1. urn, a moderately sized vessel for drawing water

    declension-1 · feminine
  2. ballot box, particularly the urns used in gathering Roman ballots under the Republic

    declension-1 · feminine · historical
  3. urn, a moderately sized vessel used to store the ashes of the cremated dead

    declension-1 · feminine
  4. bank, coin jar, a jar or urn used to store money

    declension-1 · feminine
  5. urna, a Roman unit of liquid measure equivalent to about 13 L

    declension-1 · feminine · historical
Where this word comes from

Probably from *urc-na, with simplification of the cluster. Ernout and Meillet view this word, urceus, orca and Greek ὕρχη (húrkhē) (other words for vessels) as all related somehow via borrowing (with the exact source and pathway unclear). Bennett 1907 indicates that the length of the vowel in the first syllable is not established, noting that the Italian descendant could be a learned form, and hypothesizes that the word is derived from a weak grade of the root arc-, presumably referring to the root found in arceō, arca, and arx, which is now reconstructed as *h₂erk-. However, Schrijver 1991 argues that word-initial *HRC- normally has a reflex of aRC in Latin (as in argentum from *h₂ŕ̥ǵn̥tom), which would exclude Bennett's favored etymology. By an alternative derivation, from ūrō (“burn, singe”) in reference to the firing of the clay in their creation. Cognate with Faliscan 𐌖𐌓𐌍𐌀𐌌 (urnam, accusative singular).

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.