Definition of "tergum" [ter•gum]

• The upper or dorsal surface, especially of a body segment of an insect or other arthropod. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "From the Latin 'tergum', back + 'versus', past participle of 'vertare', to turn: to use evasions or ambiguities, equivocate; to change sides, defect, apostasise."
• "Sed nec inter tantos repertus est vel unus, qui, tanquam vecors ant timidus, sive post tergum alterius declinans, seipsum a tanta caede praetendit excusare."
• "[5815] Bartholomeus Scheraeus, that famous poet laureate, and professor of Hebrew in Wittenberg: I had finished this work long since, but that inter alia dura et tristia quae misero mihi pene tergum fregerunt, (I use his own words) amongst many miseries which almost broke my back, συζυγία ob"