Questions tagged [vocabulary]
This tag is for questions concerning the meaning and usage of individual words or a few words in conjunction with each other.
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What is the meaning and use of the word 'Duco'?
I want to confirm my understanding of the word duco.
According to Wiktionary, it is a third conjugation, irregular short imperative. The examples are:
I lead, guide
I draw, pull
I think, consider
I ...
7
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1answer
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What are some examples of “subicio” being used to mean “submit, subject, present”?
In English, the epigraph of A Christmas Carol reads
I have endeavoured in this Ghostly little book, to raise the Ghost of an Idea, which shall not put my readers out of humour with themselves, with ...
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What does “eo” mean in this passage of Hyginus?
In his account of Œdipus, Hyginus writes:
[Œdipus] fortissimus præter ceteros erat eique per invidiam æquales objiciebant eum subditum esse Polybo, eo quod Polybus tam clemens esset et ille ...
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Can “simultas” simply mean “task,” or does it always connote hostility?
In his tale of Æetes, Hyginus writes
Itaque Æeta Jasoni hanc simultatem constituit: Si vellet pellem auratam auferre, tauros æripedes … jungeret …
Lewis & Short gives this ...
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Why is there no word meaning firearm in contemporary Latin?
I noticed that there is no word meaning firearm according to this site.Why is this? I've tried synonyms such as gun and pistol but none work. Has no one gotten around to making one?
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When did *discere* come to mean “to teach”?
In Anselm's Cur Deus Homo, 1.9.12, he writes:
Verbum autem quod positum est, didicit, duobus modis intelligi potest. Aut enim didicit dictum est pro: alios fecit discere, aut quia, quod per ...
asked Mar 10 '16 at 18:00
Nathaniel is protesting
10.4k3 gold badges30 silver badges95 bronze badges
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1answer
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meaning of “non omnínó”
Omnínó is defined in Lewis Elementary as
altogether, wholly, entirely, utterly, at all
[with numerals] in all, altogether, only, but, just
by all means, indeed, doubtless, yes, certainly,...
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1answer
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Why does Parthenope refer to Naples?
Vergil's tomb bears the inscription:
Mantua me genuit; Calabri rapuere; tenet nunc Parthenope; cecini Pascua, rura, duces.
Why does "Parthenope" refer to Naples?
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What did Romans call their language?
I was taught that Latinus is an adjective related to the area of Latium.
Latin would be called lingua Latina, "the language of Latium", never merely Latina.
There is a single-word expression referring ...
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Was the plural future imperative ever used?
In Latin today, we ran across the word "esto", which our teacher told us is the future singular imperative of "sum, esse". When I half-jokingly asked what the plural was, he thought for a few seconds ...
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What's the Latin word for “jade”?
I'm trying to write a short thing about a jade statuette that my family has had for roughly forever, but when I looked up "jade", I found... nothing. Well, I found plenty of results, but there was ...
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1answer
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What nuances distinguish statuó, cónstituó, and ínstituó?
I'm asking mostly in the context of living Latin and trying to figure out how to say things like "I decided," "I started a blog," "I set up an organization," "I instituted a policy," and so on, for ...
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2answers
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What does “quidem” REALLY mean?
The Lewis Elementary Latin Dictionary (via latinlexicon.org) gives the following definitions:
quidem
[expressing emphasis or assurance] assuredly, certainly, in fact, indeed
[in answers] certainly, ...
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What is the definitive definition of rem?
The word rem seems to mean all sorts of things depending on the context — sometimes it means "the thing", sometimes "it", and sometimes rem can be entirely omitted from the English translation. ...
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When is/was *vesper* second declension, and when third?
I've seen both, so obviously both were used, but are there circumstances that determine which option to use? Or is it something that changed over time?
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How can I say “undo” in Latin?
The question of how to express my username, Undo, in Latin recently came up in chat. As Ben Kovitz notes, Latin seems to lack the word 'defacio' or similar.
How can I say my name, the verb "undo", in ...
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The best way to say *interesting* in Latin
It's sometimes difficult to convey some meaning in such an old language as Latin. I have trouble with the word interesting. I've heard someone say iucundus in this meaning, but it's not an accurate ...
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1answer
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The word *quick* in Latin
There are many words, which are translated as quick. My initial search showed
celer: swift , quick, rapid; in a bad sense, hasty, rash
celox: swift , quick; f. as subst. a swift vessel, yacht
citus: ...
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2answers
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How is “quod” operating in this sentence of Hyginus?
The first sentence of Hyginus' Prometheus is:
Hominés anteá ab immortálibus ignem petébant neque in perpetuum serváre sciébant; quod posteá Prometheus in ferulá détulit in terrás, hominibusque ...
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Apicius' “sp[h]ondyli vel fonduli”
Apicius' de re coquinaria (Roman recipe book believed to have been compiled in the 4th/5th century CE) contains, in the book 3 "cepuros" on vegetables, a paragraph (XX, recipes 115 to 121) entitled "...
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“To shed blood” – profundere or effundere?
In a 1957 encyclical titled Invicti Athletae, Pope Pius XII wrote:
... non solum profuso sanguine fidei nostrae testimonium Deo praebetur ...
which the official translation renders
... not only ...
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3answers
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How should I pronounce 'ait'?
I'm interested in the proper Classical pronunciation of the word 'ait'. I've been pronouncing it as 'ate', /eɪt/.
Should it instead be pronounced as /a.it/ or even /aɪ.it/? What evidence is there ...
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What did the Romans use to close their letters?
As anyone who's written a proper letter knows, one begins with a salutation and ends with a valediction (or, in normal English, opens with "hello" and ends with "goodbye"). Right ...
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Are there feminine and neuter versions of “professor”?
From many verbs one can derive an agent noun for each gender:
computare > computator (m), computatrix (f), computatrum (n)
scribere > scriptor, scriptrix, scriptrum
Some of these derivatives ...
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3answers
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What is the meaning of “suffragio” at the time of Calvin?
In the 1559 edition of Calvin's Institutes, he writes:
Quare dum illam recipit, ac suffragio suo obsignat, non ex dubia aut alioqui controversa authenticam reddit
Ford L. Battles renders it this ...
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2answers
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What is the most neutral word for “shield”?
As you know, Latin language has several terms for what we call "shield", namely clipeus, scutum, parma, pelta etc. I'm just wondering which among them is the most "neutral" or "common" word that ...
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1answer
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Difference between “hiems” and “hībernum”
The two words both translate to "winter" in English.1,2
Although information on Wikipedia is sparse, I gather that hiems is most commonly used as a noun, while hibernum is the noun form of the more ...
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What's the difference between vel, aut, -ve, et cetera?
So I see "vel", "aut", and "-ve" being used (mostly) interchangeably in the Latin I read. Is there any idiomatic difference, or can they be used interchangeably?
For ...
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Difference between “Lacrimosa” and “Lacrymosa”
This movement from Mozart's Requiem is known as either "Lacrimosa" or "Lacrymosa" (see for instance the Wikipedia article, which uses both spellings).
Why is there two different spellings and which ...
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Are “-que” and “et” equivalent?
I was taught that one can use the '-que' suffix to string together multiple words, in a similar way to putting 'et' between them.
Are these two equivalent? Did one have a connotation in classical (...
