ludia

From lūdius (“gladiator; performer”) +‎ -a (suffix forming feminine counterparts to masculine nouns), from the root of lūdus (“game, sport, play”) and lūdō (“to play, to appear in a public game”).

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈluː.di.a/, [ˈɫ̪uːd̪iä]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈlu.di.a/, [ˈluːd̪iä]

lūdia f (genitive lūdiae, masculine lūdius); first declension

1. an actress, a female dancer
2. a gladiator's wife or mistress
   • 86 CE – 103 CE, Martial, Epigrammata 5.24.10:

     Hermes [gladiator], cura laborque ludiarum

     Hermes [the gladiator] is the darling and heart-throb of the gladiators' women^[1]

First-declension noun.

• “ludia”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “ludia”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers