Whither the word for rat-related?

September 16, 2006 1:47 PM

OK, so I'm sitting here with one of my buddies, talking about his research, and we realized that we know the word for "of or relating to mice" (murine), and the word for "of and related to cow" (bovine), but have no clue what the word for "of or related to rat" is. And after what we thought of as a pretty comprehensive web search (including this very good Google Answer), we're no closer to an answer. Anyone know what the word we're looking for is?
posted by delfuego to science & nature (14 comments total)

It's still Murine.
Both are members of family Muridae.
posted by zerokey at 1:57 PM on September 16, 2006

It's murine. OED: "Of, resembling, characteristic of, or derived from a mouse or mice; mouse-like; (Zool.) of or relating to members of the subfamily Murinae or (formerly) the family Muridae, comprising Old World mice and rats."

See, the Romans didn't distinguish between mice and rats—they were both mus (genitive muris)—so the same adjective covers both. You want a separate adjective, you have to use ratty, ratlike, etc.

(MeFites will be interested in one of the OED citations:
1979 D. ADAMS Hitch hiker's Guide to Galaxy xxxi. 148 ‘Since when’, continued his murine colleague, ‘we have had an offer of a quite enormously fat contract.’)
posted by languagehat at 1:58 PM on September 16, 2006

Bah, I took too long composing that answer.
posted by languagehat at 1:59 PM on September 16, 2006

but yours is MUCH better :)
posted by zerokey at 1:59 PM on September 16, 2006

Wow, do we feel idiotic. Thanks!
posted by delfuego at 2:14 PM on September 16, 2006

As a followup question, is there a name for those -ine words?
posted by danb at 2:35 PM on September 16, 2006

danb I think you're referring to the genitive case. It is not found in English per se but the latin form is used extensively.
posted by ptm at 2:42 PM on September 16, 2006

Wouldn't they be appellatives ("of or relating to a common noun" - Webs)? Or just adjectives. I think "a murine tail" could go either way (a genetive rat's tail, or an appellative ratlike tail) but "a murine narrator" probably means that narrator is a rat or is ratlike (appellative), rather than that the narrator belongs to a rat (genetive).
posted by nevers at 3:13 PM on September 16, 2006

Definitely not genitive.
posted by languagehat at 5:51 PM on September 16, 2006

My ear wax removal system is of, or relating to, mice and rats!
posted by maryh at 6:54 PM on September 16, 2006

As a followup question, is there a name for those -ine words?

nevers is right -- I've always heard them termed "brutal appelatives".
posted by j.edwards at 12:07 AM on September 17, 2006

I have a little bit to add. The last 10 years of my life have been spent mostly working with "murine" viruses. I've noticed that among the researchers/academics I've had contact with, "murine" is very often taken to imply mice, but not rats. I know that this isn't an accurate usage, but it seems to be fairly conventional.
posted by shoos at 1:00 AM on September 17, 2006

is there a name for those -ine words?

"Animal adjectives" was the best I could find, although that may include non-ine words as well. There's a chart of the -ines here if you scroll down.
posted by Rash at 9:58 AM on September 17, 2006

As far as I know, it's a somewhat informal attempt among scientists at using standardized nomenclature. Because every language has its own word for "mouse."

Possibly related to ICZN's nomenclature.


There's a chart of the -ines here if you scroll down.

Interesting... but scientists use "avian" for all birds, not "passerine."
posted by zennie at 8:11 AM on September 22, 2006