Scapula - scapular

Do not confuse the (etymologically related) nouns scapula and scapular. This is easily done should an intrusive '-r-' intrude.

Both are derived from the Latin scapula, 'shoulder'. This doesn't appear to be formed with the diminutive suffix [c]ule.

• Scapula is a word mostly used in anatomy and other medical sciences for the bone known in everyday English as the shoulder-blade. There is an adjective, not much used, scapular, 'of or to do with the shoulder-blade'.
• A scapular is a name used mostly in religious contexts for a short cloak that covers the shoulders. By extension, it was also used in ornithology, to label the feathers that grow in an analogous region of a bird's anatomy; and in entomology, for an analogous structure in insects.
  • Scapulars were sometimes called, archaically, scapularies.

It may be of interest to some readers of AWE to realize that both scapular and scapulary have an identical origin in medieval (Church) Latin scapularium, with an alternative form scapulare. The English form scapular is taken directly from scapulare; scapulary comes from the French derivation scapulaire, from the other Latin form scapularium. [The Online Etmological Dictionary] suggests that scapula may be derived from Latin scabere, '[to] scrape or scratch', reflecting the use by prehistoric and later people of animals' shoulder-blades as shovels for digging. (Scapere is also the root of scabies, commonly 'the itch', and a general term for skin diseases with eruptions, or scabs. (This word is not a clipping of scabies, but derives from the cognate Middle Swedish skabb-er, modern Swedish skabb, Danish skab, corresponding to OE sceabb.)