leporine

[prettygoodword]

leporine (LEP-uh-rin, LEP-uh-rain) - adj., of, pertaining to, or resembling a hare or rabbit.


Following on from leveret, another word from the same source: taken in the 1650s, a time of much Latinate adoptions, from Latin leporīnus, adjectival form (that is, genitive singular form + -īnus, of/pertaining to) of lepus, hare. And since yesterday's entirely necessary yet cute pic was a European hare, today's a European rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus):


Thanks, WikiMedia!

---L.

Comments

[conuly]

I know the word leveret because my father once read a book where the author, for no known reason, decided to refer to a random hare that way.

My father had a pretty broad vocabulary, and so did my mother, and after examining the evidence they agreed that even if that *was* the correct terminology there was absolutely no justification for using it, and certainly without defining it in the text.

[prettygoodword]

I can imagine using it unadorned in a medieval setting (or medievalesque fantasy) where hunters are using scads of technical hunting jargon. But otherwise, not without some sort of at least incluing if not an actual definition.