Incunabula, pe. cor. incunabulôrum. n. g. Plaut.All belonging to the swadling of a childe: things pertaining to infancie: the beginning of any thing.Incunabula. pro initijs. Ci. De oratoris quasi incunabulis dicere. Of the beginning and first principles of an oraor.Rudimenta & incunabula virtutis.Cic.Dicendi incunabula.Quintil.The first principles of elsquence.Ab incunabulis. Liuius. Euen from our infancie: from out cradell.Ab incunabulis nostræ veteris puerilisque doctrinæ.Cicer.From the first beginning of our olde instructions learned when we were children.In his locis vestigia ac propè incunabula reperiuntur deorÛ. Cicero. Incunabula. Suet. Cic.The place where one was borne and bred, or the first beginning of his stocke and kinred.Iouis incunabula Crete.Ouid.
Lewis and Short: Latin dictionary
in-cūnābŭla, ōrum, n., swaddlingclothes, swathing-bands.I.Lit.: fasciis opus est, pulvinis, cunis, incunabulis, Plaut. Truc. 5, 13; id. Am. 5, 1, 52.— B.Transf.1.The cradle: Bacchi, Ov. M. 3, 317.— 2.A birthplace: in montes patrios, et ad incunabula nostra pergam, Poët. (perh. Enn.) ap. Cic. Att. 2, 15, 3 (v. Vahl. Enn. p. 81): Jovis, Ov. M. 8, 99: majorum, Just. 31, 8, 4.—3.Childhood: jam inde ab incunabulis imbutus odio tribunorum,
from the cradle
,
from childhood
, Liv. 4, 36 fin.; so, ab primis, Amm. 14, 6, 4; and: in primis vitae incunabulis, Firm. 1, 3.— II.Trop., an origin, beginning: de oratoris quasi incunabulis dicere, Cic. Or. 13, 42: nostrae doctrinae, id. de Or. 1, 6, 23: ab ipsis discendi velut incunabulis, Quint. prooem. 6 Zumpt N. cr.