pinnaculum

From pinna (“plume, wing; parapet”). Pinnāculum appears in the Vulgate as a calque of Ancient Greek πτερύγιον (pterúgion, “pinnacle”), diminutive of πτέρυξ (ptérux, “wing”) (alternative translations of the Greek include fastīgium and pinna itself).[1] Therefore, the end of the word appears to be the neuter form of the Latin diminutive suffix -culus. However, pinnāculum is not a regularly formed diminutive: there is an irregular change of gender from the feminine base and an unexpected -ā- between the base and the suffix. The form may have been influenced by that of nouns ending in -āculum that were derived from the instrument noun suffix -culum: the Oxford English Dictionary suggests that the form pinnāculum was possibly based on analogy with prōpugnāculum (“bulwark, rampart”), from prōpugnō +‎ -culum.[2]

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /pinˈnaː.ku.lum/, [pɪnˈnäːkʊɫ̪ʊ̃ˑ]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /pinˈna.ku.lum/, [pinˈnäːkulum]

pinnāculum n (genitive pinnāculī); second declension

1. (Late Latin) a peak, pinnacle

Second-declension noun (neuter).

• → English: pinnacle
• → French: pinacle
• Italian: pennacchio (“plume”)
  • → Middle French: pennache
    • French: panache
      • → English: panache
      • → Italian: panache
      • → Romanian: panaș
  • → Portuguese: penacho
  • → Spanish: penacho
• Italian: pinnacolo (“pinnacle”) (probably borrowed), (possibly) pinnacolo (“pinochle”) (borrowing)
• Old French: penail
• → Portuguese: pináculo
• → Spanish: pináculo

• “pinnaculum”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• pinnaculum in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• pinnaculum in Ramminger, Johann (2016 July 16 (last accessed)) Neulateinische Wortliste: Ein Wörterbuch des Lateinischen von Petrarca bis 1700‎, pre-publication website, 2005-2016