isthmus

See also: Isthmus

English

WOTD – 5 November 2010

English Wikipedia has an article on:

isthmus (disambiguation)

Wikipedia

An isthmus (narrow strip of land).

Etymology

Borrowing from Latin isthmus (“a strip of land between two seas”), from Ancient Greek ῐ̓σθμός (isthmós, “neck, narrow passage”), possibly from εἶμῐ (eîmi, “to go”). Cognate to Old Norse eið (“isthmus”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈɪsθ.məs/, /ˈɪs.məs/, /ˈɪz.məs/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈɪs.məs/
• (obsolete) IPA^(key): /ˈɪst.məs/

  • Audio (US):

    (file)

• Rhymes: -ɪsməs

Noun

isthmus (plural isthmuses or isthmi)

2. (geography) A narrow strip of land, bordered on both sides by water, and connecting two larger landmasses.

   Hyponym: Isthmus of Suez

3. (anatomy) Any such narrow part connecting two larger structures.

   Hyponym: uterine isthmus

4. (graph theory) An edge in a graph whose deletion increases the number of connected components of the graph.

Derived terms

• isthmic
• isthmoid
• isthmo-, isthm-
• isthmusectomy
• Isthmus-Mecayapan Nahuatl
• Isthmus Nahuatl
• Isthmus of Perekop
• Isthmus of Suez
• Isthmus Zapotec

 

Translations

strip of land

Albanian: rrypinë (sq) f Arabic: بَرْزَخ (ar) m (barzaḵ) Armenian: պարանոց (hy) (paranocʻ) Asturian: ismu m Azerbaijani: berzah, boyun (az) Basque: istmo Belarusian: перашы́ек m (pjerašýjek), пярэ́смык m (pjarésmyk) Bulgarian: про́влак (bg) m (próvlak) Catalan: istme (ca) m Chinese: Mandarin: 地峽／地峡 (zh) (dìxiá) Crimean Tatar: boyun Czech: převlaka f, šíje (cs) f Danish: landtange c Dutch: landengte (nl) f, istmus (nl) m Esperanto: terkolo Estonian: maakitsus Faroese: eiði n, eið n Finnish: kannas (fi) French: isthme (fr) m Galician: istmo (gl) m Georgian: ყელი (ka) (q̇eli) German: Isthmus (de) m, Landenge f, Landbrücke (de) f Greek: ισθμός (el) m (isthmós) Ancient: ἰσθμός m (isthmós) Guaraní: yvyjyva Hawaiian: pūʻali Hebrew: מיצר \ מֵצַר (he) m (meitsár) Hindi: स्थलडमरूमध्य m (sthalḍamrūmadhya), भूडमरुमध्य m (bhūḍamrumadhya), योजक (hi) m (yojak), भू-संधि f (bhū-sandhi), संयोग भूमि f (sãyog bhūmi) Hungarian: földszoros (hu), földhíd, (please verify) földnyelv (hu) Icelandic: eiði n, grandi m Ido: istmo (io) Indonesian: daratan sempit, tanah genting (id) Irish: cuing f Italian: istmo (it) m, braccio di terra m Japanese: 地峡 (ja) (ちきょう, chikyō), 峡部 (きょうぶ, kyōbu) Kazakh: мойнақ (kk) (moinaq) Khmer: បួរដី (km) (buədəy) Korean: 지협(地峽) (ko) (jihyeop), 협부(峽部) (hyeopbu) Kurdish: Northern Kurdish: berzax (ku) Kyrgyz: моюн (ky) (moyun) Lao: ຄໍ (lo) (khǭ), ກີ່ວ (kīu) Latin: isthmus m Latvian: zemesšaurums m, šaurums (lv) m Lithuanian: sąsmauka f Macedonian: провлак m (provlak) Malay: segenting Manx: quing hallooin f Maori: kūititanga Mongolian: Cyrillic: хүзүүвч (mn) (xüzüüvč) Northern Sami: muotki Northern Sotho: molalanaga ? Norwegian: Bokmål: eid (no) n Nynorsk: eid n Old Norse: eið n Ossetian: къубалӕг (k’ubalæg) Persian: برزخ (fa) (barzax) Polish: przesmyk (pl) m, istm (pl) m, istmus m, międzymorze n Portuguese: istmo (pt) m Romanian: istm (ro) n Russian: переше́ек (ru) m (perešéjek) Serbo-Croatian: Cyrillic: земљоуз m Roman: zemljouz m Slovak: úžina f, šija f Slovene: ožina (sl) f, zemeljska ožina (sl) f Spanish: istmo (es) m Swedish: näs (sv) n, ed (sv) n Old Swedish: ēþ n Tagalog: tangkay (tl), dalahikan Tajik: барзах (barzax), гардана (gardana) Tatar: муентык (muyentıq) Thai: คอคอด (th) (kɔɔ-kɔ̂ɔt) Turkish: berzah (tr), kıstak (tr) Turkmen: please add this translation if you can Ukrainian: переши́йок m (perešýjok) Urdu: خاکنائے m (xāknāē) Uyghur: بويۇن (boyun) Uzbek: boʻyin (uz) Vietnamese: eo đất (vi) Welsh: culdir m West Frisian: lâningte (fy) c

part connecting two anatomical structures

Chinese: Mandarin: 峽／峡 (zh) (xiá) Danish: please add this translation if you can Finnish: kannas (fi) Italian: istmo (it) m Kazakh: қылта (qylta) Portuguese: please add this translation if you can Russian: перемы́чка (ru) f (peremýčka)

edge in a graph

Chinese: Mandarin: 橋邊／桥边 (zh) (qiáobiān) Danish: please add this translation if you can Finnish: kannas (fi) Portuguese: please add this translation if you can Russian: ребро́ (ru) n (rebró)

References

• Jespersen, Otto (1909) A Modern English Grammar on Historical Principles (Sammlung germanischer Elementar- und Handbücher; 9)‎, volumes I: Sounds and Spellings, London: George Allen & Unwin, published 1961, § 7.736, page 225.
• “isthmus”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
• “isthmus”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.

Latin

Alternative forms

• isthmos (unadapted)

Etymology

Borrowing from Ancient Greek ῐ̓σθμός (isthmós, “neck, narrow passage”), possibly from εἶμῐ (eîmi, “to go”).

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈistʰ.mus/, [ˈɪs̠t̪ʰmʊs̠]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈist.mus/, [ˈist̪mus]

Noun

isthmus m (genitive isthmī); second declension

1. a strip of land between two seas; an isthmus
   1. (transferred sense, poetic) a strait

This entry needs quotations to illustrate usage. If you come across any interesting, durably archived quotes then please add them!

Usage notes

• Capitalised as Isthmus, it refers to the Isthmus of Corinth.

Inflection

Second-declension noun.

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	isthmus	isthmī
Genitive	isthmī	isthmōrum
Dative	isthmō	isthmīs
Accusative	isthmum	isthmōs
Ablative	isthmō	isthmīs
Vocative	isthme	isthmī

Derived terms

• Isthmus

Descendants

Descendants of isthmus

• → Asturian: ismu
• → Catalan: istme
• → Dutch: istmus
• → English: isthmus
• → Esperanto: istmo
  • Ido: istmo
• → French: isthme
  • → Romanian: istm
• → Galician: istmo
• → German: Isthmus
• → Italian: istmo
• → Portuguese: istmo
• → Spanish: istmo
  • → Basque: istmo

References

• “Isthmus”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press

Further reading

• isthmus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.