embolus

From Latin embolus (“piston”), from Ancient Greek ἔμβολος (émbolos, “peg, stopper”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈɛmbələs/

embolus (plural emboli or emboluses)

1. (pathology) An obstruction causing an embolism: a blood clot, air bubble or other matter carried by the bloodstream and causing a blockage or occlusion of a blood vessel.
2. (zoology) The structure on the end of the palp of male arachnids which contains the opening to the ejaculatory duct.
   • 1996, Michael J Roberts, Spiders of Britain and Northern Europe, Collins 1996, p. 22:

     Those spiders with a simple bulb insert most of this; those with a complex palp insert only the embolus, which in some species is very long […]

• embolon
• thrombus

embolus m

1. embolus (an obstruction causing an embolism)

• embolus in Příruční slovník jazyka českého, 1935–1957
• embolus in Slovník spisovného jazyka českého, 1960–1971, 1989

• imbolus (Medieval)

From Ancient Greek ἔμβολος (émbolos).

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈem.bo.lus/, [ˈɛm.bɔ.ɫʊs]

embolus m (genitive embolī); second declension

1. piston
   • c. 15 BCE, Vitruvius, De architectura 10.7.1–3:

     Insequitur nunc de Ctesibica machina, quae in altitudinem aquam educit, monstrare. Ea si ex aere. Cuius in radicibus modioli fiunt gemelli paulum distantes, habentes fistulas furcillae figura similiter cohaerentes, in medium catinum concurrentes. In quo catino fiant asses in superioribus naribus fistularum coagmentatione subtili conlocati, qui praeobturantes foramina narium non patiuntur quod spiritu in catinum est expressum.
     Supra catinum paenula ut infundibulum inversum est attemperata et per fibulam cum catino cuneo traiecto continetur, ne vis inflationis aqua eam cogat elevari. Insuper fistula, quae tuba dicitur, coagmentata in altitudine fit erecta. Modioli autem habent infra nares inferiores fistularum asses interpositos supra foramina eorum, quae sunt in fundis.
     Ita de supernis in modiolis emboli masculi torno politi et oleo subacti conclusique regulis et vectibus conmoliuntur. Qui erit aer ibi cum aqua, assibus obturantibus foramina cogent. Extrudent inflando pressionibus per fistularum nares aquam in catinum, e quo recipiens paenula spiritu exprimit per fistulam in altitudinem, et ita ex inferiore loco castello conlocato ad saliendum aqua subministratur.

     Next I must tell about the machine of Ctesibius, which raises water to a height. It is made of bronze, and has at the bottom a pair of cylinders set a little way apart, and there is a pipe connected with each, the two running up, like the prongs of a fork, side by side to a vessel which is between the cylinders. In this vessel are valves, accurately fitting over the upper vents of the pipes, which stop up the ventholes, and keep what has been forced by pressure into the vessel from going down again.
     Over the vessel a cowl is adjusted, like an inverted funnel, and fastened to the vessel by means of a wedge thrust through a staple, to prevent it from being lifted off by the pressure of the water that is forced in. On top of this a pipe is jointed, called the trumpet, which stands up vertically. Valves are inserted in the cylinders, beneath the lower vents of the pipes, and over the openings which are in the bottoms of the cylinders.
     Pistons smoothly turned, rubbed with oil, and inserted from above into the cylinders, work with their rods and levers upon the air and water in the cylinders, and, as the valves stop up the openings, force and drive the water, by repeated pressure and expansion, through the vents of the pipes into the vessel, from which the cowl receives the inflated currents, and sends them up through the pipe at the top; and so water can be supplied for a fountain from a reservoir at a lower level.

2. (Medieval Latin) alley, back street
3. (New Latin) anything oblong that can be thrusted into something, peg, plug, rod
   1. (New Latin) gunstick, ramrod
      • 1680, Meninski, Franciszek à Mesgnien, “embolus”, in Thesaurus linguarum orientalium, Turcicae, Arabicae, Persicae, praecipuas earum opes à Turcis peculiariter usurpatas continens, nimirum Lexicon Turkico-Arabico-Persicum‎ (in Ottoman Turkish, Turkish, Latin, German, Italian, French, and Polish), Vienna, column 1297:

        تفنك چبوغی tüfenk ćiubughy. Embolus, bacillus immisorius, virga stipatoria, quâ inculcatur farsum. Ladstecke / Ladstab. La bachetta. La baguette. Sztępel.

        —

   2. (New Latin) any foreign body that travels through the blood vessels, such that it becomes lodged

Second declension.

• → Catalan: èmbol
• → Czech: embolus
• → English: embolus
• → Spanish: émbolo

• embolus in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• embolus in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition, 1883–1887)
• embolus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire Illustré Latin-Français, Hachette