Kilo Lingo

#833 of 5,000 Core 1000

Translation

leader, commander; guide

Examples

vulneratus .

The leader of the army was wounded.

.

The leaders of the people assembled.

ductore .

They did not make the journey without a guide.

Ductorem .

They spent a long time looking for a guide.

legerunt.

They chose two leaders.

Ductor, ductoris, m., third declension, an agent noun off duco: the one who leads. Latin already had dux for that job, so ductor stays largely a poet's word - Virgil uses it of Aeneas and of the Trojan captains - and later prose picks it up for a guide or a commander where dux would sound too much like a title.

It is formed the ordinary way: take the supine stem duct-, add -or, and you have the doer. Scriptor from scribo, victor from vinco, lector from lego, all the same machine. English never borrowed ductor itself but took plenty from the stem: conduct, conductor, ductile, and the anatomist's duct, the channel that leads something somewhere.

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Latin · Free printables

ductor: worksheet, infographic and listicle

Free printable study downloads for the Latin word "ductor" (leader, commander; guide): a worksheet with the answer key built in, an infographic, and a sentence listicle. Open any one to view, print or save.

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This word is part of lesson 17.