ariena

Perhaps derived from an unattested adjective *ariēnus (“ram-shaped”), from aries (“ram”), on account of the similarly curved shape of a ram's horns.

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /a.riˈeː.na/, [äriˈeːnä]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /a.riˈe.na/, [äriˈɛːnä]

ariēna f (genitive ariēnae); first declension

1. (Classical Latin, rare) banana
   • c. 77 CE – 79 CE, Pliny the Elder, Naturalis Historia XII.24:

     Maior alia pomo et suavitate praecellentior, quo sapientes Indorum vivunt. Folium alas avium imitatur, longitudine trium cubitorum, latitudine duum. Fructum cortice emittit admirabilem suci dulcedine, ut uno quaternos satiet. Arbori nomen palae, pomo arienae. Plurima est in Sydracis, expeditionum Alexandri termino.

     There is a greater one, surpassing other fruit trees even in softness, which Indian sages live on. Its leaf copies the wings of birds, being three cubits in length and two in width. It produces its fruit from its bark, and the fruit is astonishing in its sweetness, one being enough for four people. The name of the tree is the pala, and ariena that of the fruit. It is found in great number among the Sydraci, at the limit of Alexander the Great's campaigns.

First-declension noun.

• banana (New Latin)
• mūsa (14th century)

• Italian: ariena

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