Dogs are canine, cats are feline, cows are bovine. What's with all the -ines?

Mental Floss Fact of the Day ^ | April 18, 2004 | anonymous

[redhead]

While all animal adjectives don't end in -ine (simian, for instance), most of them do. There are -ine terms for more animals than most people know. Here's a short list of some of the lesser-known entries on the list:

bats — pteropine
bulls — taurine
crows — corvine
deer — cervine
eagles — aquiline
fish — piscine
foxes — vulpine
frogs — ranine
geese — anserine
hares — leporine
horses — equine
kangaroo — macropodine
lobster — homarine
mice — murine
peacocks — pavonine
pigs — porcine
seals — phocine
sheep — ovine
ticks — acarine
wasps — vespine
wolves — lupine

So the next time you're out in your back yard, think how impressed your next door neighbors will be when you point to a squirrel and calmly say: "My, what a fine sciurine specimen." You just can't argue with that kind of knowledge.

[Redcloak]

Mooses - Alcine

[HighWheeler]

Rantissi is supine.

[HighWheeler]

forgot the photo

Rantisi is supine.

[TaxRelief]

The suffix -ine means having the nature of and is synonymous with the suffix -like.

The suffix -ine is generally applied to the Latin root, while the suffix -like is generally added to the English root.

So, for instance, lupine means wolflike; Divine means Godlike; and assinine means donkeylike.