leonine

Meanings

Adjective

• Of, pertaining to, or characteristic of a lion.

Noun

• A 13th-century coin minted in Europe and used in England as a debased form of the sterling silver penny, outlawed under Edward I.
• A kind of Latin verse, generally alternate hexameter and pentameter, rhyming at the middle and end.

Origin

• From Latin leōnīnus ("lion-like"); leo + -ine.
• Perhaps from Leoninus, a 12th-century canon in Paris, or from Pope Leo II.