Cotta

Uncertain. Two possibilities include a variant of cocta (“cooked”), intending sunburnt or tanned, or a Latinization of ancient Italiot Greek κόττος (“cockscomb”), intending cowlicked.

(Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈkot.ta/, [ˈkɔt̪ːä]

• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈkot.ta/, [ˈkɔt̪ːä]

Cotta m sg (genitive Cottae); first declension

1. A cognomen of the gens Aurelia

   Gaius Aurelius Cotta

    

First-declension noun, singular only.

• “Cotta”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• Cotta in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• George Davis Chase, "Origin of Roman Praenomina", Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, Vol. 8, 1897, p. 109.