miraculum

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English

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Etymology

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From Latin mīrāculum. Doublet of milagro and miracle.

Noun

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miraculum

  1. (rare, nonstandard) A miracle.
    • 1869, Benjamin Place [pseudonym; Edward Thring], chapter VI, in Thoughts on Life-Science, London; Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Macmillan and Co., →OCLC, pages 73–74:
      [W]hat is there wonderful in these ever-present spirit-agencies and intelligent wills, whilst working under God every material force, changing at any moment whether perceptibly or imperceptibly the direction of the material forces they wield; what miraculum would there be if every drop of rain is guided or shot through air by a living power?
    • 1881, Warren J[udson] Brier, A Soldier of Fortune: A Modern Comedy-Drama in Five Acts. [] (The Star Drama), Chicago, Ill.: T[homas] S[tewart] Denison, →OCLC, act III, scene i, page 30:
      It’s a miraculum she warn’t tored all into little pieces no bigger dan a wash tub.
    • 2001 October, Bronwyn Cleland, “Deux Ex Machina”, in Room 14 at 8 O’Clock: An Anthology of Poetry & Short Stories (The Richmond Writers’ Circle Anthology 2001), Richmond, London: Richmond Writers’ Circle, →ISBN, page 40:
      She had no time for the virtues of patience and we would hear the familiar sigh pitched to perfection and ‘All we need, all we want is a miraculum, just one small one.’ As the convoluted talk of illusory deities and miracles spiralled, we elder children sometimes deviated from my mother’s doctrine by demanding a straight answer as to how she saw her miracle manifesting.
    • 2020, Stanisław Rosik, “The space of the turning point in the context of its neighbours: Pomeranian communities within the circle of the pagan ‘international’”, in Stanisław Rosik, editor, Europe Reaches the Baltic: Poland and Pomerania in the Shaping of European Civilization (10th–12th Centuries) (Scripta Historica Europaea; 6), Wrocław: University of Wrocław, →ISBN, section 3 (Pomerania – Poland – Europe. In search of their own paths), subsection II (Pomerania in the zone of Polish expansion in the age of Bolesław III the Wrymouth. Conquest and Christianization), page 330:
      This theological interpretation is meaningfully illustrated with a miraculum, which according to Ebo (III, 1) happened in Güzkow. An enormous swarm of terrifying flies flew out of a pagan temple destroyed during Otto’s missions, embodying the residing evil forces. Chased away with prayers and signs of cross they ultimately flew to Rugia.

Latin

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Etymology

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From mīror (I wonder or marvel at) +‎ -culum (derivative suffix).

Pronunciation

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Noun

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mīrāculum n (genitive mīrāculī); second declension

  1. wonder, marvel, miracle; a wonderful, strange or marvellous thing.
    Synonyms: portentum, mōnstrum, ostentum, prōdigium, mīrum
  2. wonderfulness, marvellousness.

Declension

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Second-declension noun (neuter).

Case Singular Plural
Nominative mīrāculum mīrācula
Genitive mīrāculī mīrāculōrum
Dative mīrāculō mīrāculīs
Accusative mīrāculum mīrācula
Ablative mīrāculō mīrāculīs
Vocative mīrāculum mīrācula

Derived terms

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Descendants

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References

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  • miraculum”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  • miraculum”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
  • miraculum in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.