cloaca

Borrowed from Latin cloāca (“sewer”), related to cluō (“cleanse; purge”), but the derivation is uncertain.^[1][2]

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /kləʊˈeɪ.kə/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /kloʊˈeɪ.kə/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -eɪkə
• Hyphenation: clo‧a‧ca

cloaca (plural cloacas or cloacae)

1. (sometimes figurative) A sewer.
   • 1773, Gentleman's Magazine, number 43, page 598:

     The Thames, polluted with the filthy effusions of the cloacae.

   • 1850, Thomas Carlyle, chapter IV, in Latter-day Pamphlets, page 46:
   • […] that tremendous cloaca of Pauperism […]
   • 1898, H.G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, London: William Heinemann, page 266:

     After working an hour, I began to speculate on the distance one had to go before the cloaca was reached the chances we had of missing it altogether.

2. (anatomy, zoology) The opening in reptiles, amphibians and birds, as well as elasmobranchians, lobe-finned fishes, marsupials and monotreme mammals, which serves as the common outlet for the urogenital ducts and rectum.
   • 1822, John Mason Good, The Study of Medicine, volume I, page 7:

     In birds the rectum, at the termination of its canal, forms an oval or elongated pouch […] and then expands into a cavity, which has been named cloaca.

3. An outhouse or lavatory.
   • 1840, Frederick Marryat, chapter XXIV, in Olla Podrida:

     To every house […] a cloaca.

   • 1880, William Blades, The Enemies of Books, page 55:

     Only think of that cloaca being supplied daily with such dainty bibliographical treasures!

4. (anatomy) A duct through which gangrenous material escapes a body.
   • 1846, Joseph François Malgaigne, translated by Frederick Brittan, Manual of Operative Surgery, page 172:

     Across this shell [sc. of bone] small holes are eaten, by which the matter escapes, and which are called cloacae (Weidmann).

5. (embryology) Structure in the embryo during the development of the reproductive and urinary systems.

• (sewer): See sewer
• (duct): See vent
• (outhouse or lavatory): See Thesaurus:bathroom

• external genitalia

• Caloca

Borrowed from Latin cloaca.

• IPA^(key): /ˌkloːˈaː.kaː/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: clo‧a‧ca

cloaca f (plural cloaca's)

1. (zoology) cloaca (duct in certain vertebrates used for reproduction and excreting digestive waste)

• cloacadier

Borrowed from Latin cloaca. Cognate to the inherited doublet chiavica.

• IPA^(key): /kloˈa.ka/
• Rhymes: -aka
• Hyphenation: clo‧à‧ca

cloaca f (plural cloache)

1. sewer
2. cesspit, cesspool
3. (anatomy) cloaca

• cloacale

• cloaca in Treccani.it – Vocabolario Treccani on line, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana

• clovāca, cluāca (Late Republican)
• coācla, covācla (metathesis, proscribed)
• clāvaca, clābaca (later metathesis)

Related to cluō (“cleanse”), but the derivation is uncertain. See de Vaan (2008) for discussion.^[1]

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [kɫoˈaː.ka]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [kloˈaː.ka]

cloāca f (genitive cloācae); first declension

1. An underground drain, sewer.
   1. (humorous) Of the mouth and intestines of a voracious person.

First-declension noun.

• “cloaca”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “cloaca”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• "cloaca", in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
• “cloaca”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper’s Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “cloaca”, in William Smith et al., editor (1890), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, London: William Wayte. G. E. Marindin

Borrowed from Latin cloaca.

• Rhymes: -akɐ
• Hyphenation: clo‧a‧ca

cloaca f (plural cloacas)

1. (anatomy) cloaca (excretory and genital duct in bird, reptiles and fish)

• IPA^(key): [ˈklo̯aka]

cloaca f

1. definite nominative/accusative singular of cloacă

Borrowed from Latin cloāca (“sewer”), from cluō (“cleanse”).

• IPA^(key): /kloˈaka/ [kloˈa.ka]
• Rhymes: -aka
• Syllabification: clo‧a‧ca

cloaca f (plural cloacas)

1. sewer, storm drain
2. (zoology) cloaca

• “cloaca”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 10 December 2024