cochlea

Borrowed from Latin cochlea (“a snail”), from Ancient Greek κόχλιας (kókhlias, “a snail with a spiral shell”).

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈkɒk.li.ə/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈkoʊ.kli.ə/, /ˈkɑk.li.ə/

cochlea (plural cochleae or cochleas)

1. (anatomy) The complex, spirally coiled, tapered cavity of the inner ear of higher vertebrates, which contains the organ of Corti and in which sound vibrations are converted into nerve impulses.
2. A spiral-shaped shell, especially that of a snail.

• “cochlea”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
• “cochlea”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.

• coclea, coclia, cochlia

Borrowed from Ancient Greek κοχλῐ́ᾱς (kokhlíās, “snail with a spiral shell”).

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈko.kʰle.a/, [ˈkɔkʰɫ̪eä]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈko.kle.a/, [ˈkɔːkleä]

cochlea f (genitive cochleae); first declension

1. snail

   in cochleam ― snail-shaped, in the shape of a spiral

   1. snailshell
2. (metonymically)
   1. spiral (form of a snailshell)
   2. screw of a press
   3. Archimedes' screw, water screw, screw pump (machine for drawing water by raising it)
   4. A kind of revolving door.

First-declension noun.

• coc(h)lear
• coc(h)leārium
• coc(h)leātim
• coc(h)leātus

• “cochlea” on page 373 of the Oxford Latin Dictionary (2nd ed., 2012)

• “cochlea”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “cochlea”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• cochlea in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• “cochlea”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “cochlea”, in William Smith et al., editor (1890), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, London: William Wayte. G. E. Marindin