adoleo

Pronunciation

• IPA (Classical): [aˈdɔ.ɫe.oː]^[1]
• IPA (Ecclesiastical): [aˈdɔː.le.o]^[1]

Forms

adoleō (present infinitive adolēre); second conjugation, no passive, no perfect or supine stems^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin ad- + oleō (“to feed (the fire)”), from Proto-Italic *oleje-, Proto-Indo-European *h₂ol-éye- (“to feed”), the causative of the root of alō “to nourish”.^[2][1] The LIV explains the shift from “to feed” to “to burn” by its use in offerings, “to feed the fire”, which also fits altāria “altar”, a derivative of the participle *alto- “fed”.^[2] Cognate with Umbrian uřetu, which takes the object pir (“fire”).^[2][3][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan dates it from Lucretius, who speaks of making altars smoke with offerings.^[2][3] Köbler dates Lucretius 96–55 BC.^[5]

Semantic evolution

It meant to make a burnt offering of, to burn in sacrifice, and with an ablative to honour an altar or gods with burnt offerings, as Virgil's Dido who feeds the household gods with flames.^[3][6] From the ritual it came to mean to burn or destroy by fire, as Ovid's stubble burnt after the harvest.^[3] Lewis and Short also record a Plautine verb “to give off a smell”.^[7]

Its participle adultus “fed” is the same in form as that of adolēscō “to grow up”, from the same root.^[2][1]

Timeline

• 96–55 BC – Lucretius speaks of altars heaped with offerings.^[3][5]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil uses it of offerings to the household gods.^[3][5]
• 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid uses it of burning stubble.^[3][5]

Meanings

Verb

1. To make a burnt offering of, burn ritually.^[3]
2. To make offerings on (an altar), honour with offerings.^[3]
3. To destroy by fire, burn.^[3]

Word family

• adolefactus
• adolēscō

Related words

• aboleō
• alō
• altāria

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
5. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
7. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press