English → Latin
“apparition” in Latin
speciēsseeing, view, look; spectacle, sight; external appearance, looks; general outline or shapeumbrashadow; shade, ghost, phantom, apparition; the realm of shades, the shades, the world below or underworldlārvaspooky ghost, haunt, evil spirit, terror; horrific mask; banquet ghost: a skeleton doll with movable joints seated at thvideōto see, perceive; look (at); to observe, note; to understand, perceive, comprehendostendōto expose to view, exhibit, show; to reveal, expose, make known; to explain, clarifyprōdigiumomen, portent, prophetic sign; prodigy, wonderportendōto indicate, point out; to predict, foretell, portendadventusarrival, coming, approach, advent; Adventpraesēnspresent, immediate, at hand, existing; prompt; propitiousmortuusdead, having died; decayed, withered; faint, overwhelmed
The English word apparition itself goes back to Latin pāreō, through apparitio.
Riddle & Arnold A Copious and Critical English–Latin Lexicon, 1864
apparition
species (any appearance; e.g., mortui, Appul.): simulacrum vanum (Ov., deceitful appearance): umbra (shadow; e.g., mortui. Suet.): larva (disembodied soul, as an evil spirit of the night): visum (something seen, a vision: also visum somnii or somniantis [Vid: Vision]): ostentum: prodigium: portentum (astonishing appearance, foretelling what is about to happen). A frighiful apparition, objecta res terribilis. Sometimes “species nova atque insolita” An apparition of the night, visum nocturnum :”species nocturna”: in the heaven, phaenomenon. Spectrum is not Latin in this sense; = εἴδωλον only in the sense of the Stoics: mostellum found only in the second (spurious) argument of Plaut., Mostellaria. Apuleius has also occursacula noctium: bustorum formidamina: sepulcrorum terriculamenta (terrific spectres haunting graves). To fear apparitions, simulacra vana timere: to be disturbed by apparitions, umbris inqmetari. I see apparitions, “obviae mihi fiunt species mortuorum.”
Appearance, adventus (approach): praesentia (presence): species. A sudden apparition, repentinus objectus (Nep., Hann., 5, 2).
Quick answer
- What is the Latin word for apparition?
- The usual Latin words for “apparition” are speciēs, umbra, lārva; also videō, ostendō, prōdigium. The right choice depends on the sense; see the distinctions below.
Entry from J. E. Riddle & T. K. Arnold, A Copious and Critical English–Latin Lexicon (rev. C. Anthon, New York: Harper, 1864), digitised by Fergus J. P. Walsh, CC BY-SA 4.0; Latin markup adapted by latindictionary.co.