General Question

erik's avatar

What is the term for 'of or relating to goats'?

Asked by erik (63points) January 6th, 2007
e.g. Pig = porcine, Cat = feline, Cow = bovine, Goat = ???
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10 Answers

gailcalled's avatar
NO idea, but ursine = bear, taurine = bull, vulpine= fox, ovine = sheep; if logic followed, which it doesn't, word would be caprine. Latin for goat is caper, I think.
brownlemur's avatar
caprine is correct. at least that's what I have always said. Just for fun, here are more: Vulpine=Fox, equine=horse, aquiline=eagle, eusuchian=alligator, myrmecine=ant, piscine=fish, leonine=lion, murine=mouse, lutrine=otter, anguine=snake. There are many more, and some of those animals have alternate adjectives describing them. Enjoy!
gailcalled's avatar
Great fun. La fourmi is ant in French; formic acic is found in ants among other sources (spiders & nettles). La piscine is French for swimming pool, and isn't there some eyedrops called Murine? And half the constellations in the heavens have these Latin names for animal. Ursa Major and Minor, Vulpecula, Pisces, Aquila, Taurus, Capricorn, Equus, Leo, Draco the dragon (draconian)...no ants, alligators, otters, or mice up there that I know of. Thanks for the entertainment, brownlemur. What, BTW, is a lemur?
brownlemur's avatar
If you are asking what the adjectival desciptor for lemur-like is, I'd go with lemurine or prosimian, although prosimian can describe lemurs, lorises and bushbabies (and sometimes tarsiers). If you are asking what a lemur is in general, it is a type of primate found only on the island of Madagascar. See more at www.brownlemur.com and www.savethelemur.org. (FYI, "Lemur" means "ghost" in Latin).
JCS's avatar
also interesting, even though I agree caprine is the word you are looking for, is that "capric" is relating to the smell of goats.
gailcalled's avatar
I see in dict. that capric acid smells like goats. So, what's a goat smell like? Different from the other barnyard animals? I walk by these all the time here in hicksville, and it is hard to sort out the different odors...rather a nice melange, however.
JCS's avatar
According to the internet, a clean goat should "smell of nothing other than clean straw and sweet hay." So maybe that's what capric acid smells like.
JCS's avatar
and the internet never lies...
Thammuz's avatar

Either Caprine or Ovine, i’m not sure which. I think Ovine is related to sheeps but i’m not entirely sure. Surely, though, i’m too lazy too look it up…

logophulax's avatar

Ive always found this annoying, as there is no clear rule when to use Greek and when to use Latin, so there is no way of knowing these terms a priori.
For example if ‘myermicine’ is for ant it derives from the Greek ‘myrmex’ rather than the Latin ‘formica’. And in the case of ’-ology’s and -‘phobia’s, you’d of thought we’d always use a greek prefix to match the Greek suffix, but we don’t….e.g Bovinophobia from the Latin Bovnus, and even weirder ‘Swinophobia’, where ‘swine’ has a Germanic origin.
Call me pedantic but things like that irritate me.

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