Beatrice

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A feminine first name of Latin origin borne by many women ; the idealized guide who leads the poet through Paradise in Dante's epic ; a small city in southeastern Nebraska, United States
2. A common girl's first name derived from Latin ; the beloved woman who escorts the narrator through heaven in Dante's Divine Comedy ; a town in the southeast of the American state of Nebraska
3. A woman's personal name of Latin roots ; the celestial guide who accompanies the poet through the spheres of paradise in Dante's great poem ; a municipality located in southeastern Nebraska

Etymology: Beatrice is a name that has been carried by saints, poets and royals for nearly two thousand years, yet its exact meaning is still debated. The Latin "Beatrix" was a name given to early Christian saints, and it is usually connected to "beatrix", which means "she who makes happy" or "she who blesses." That reading ties the name to the Latin "beata", meaning "blessed" or "happy," which was the common currency of religious devotion. A rival explanation holds that the name was shaped less by "beata" than by "viatrix", meaning "female wayfarer" or "traveller." On this view the name would mean something closer to "she who travels," a far humbler and more practical idea. Scholars treat the blessing sense as the more probable one, but the traveller reading has never fully been ruled out.