agnellus

Forms

agnellus m (genitive agnellī); second declension^[1][2]

Etymology

It is formed from Latin agnus (“lamb”) + -ellus,^[1][2] though the TLL also allows a diminutive of agnulus (“little lamb”).^[3][4] De Vaan reconstructs the diminutive already for Proto-Italic, as Proto-Italic *agʷnelo-, beside *agʷno- (“lamb”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂egʷ-no- (“lamb”).^[5] The base is cognate with Ancient Greek ἀμνός (amnós, “lamb”) and Old Irish úan (“lamb”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus has it in the Asinaria,^[6][2] as a term of endearment: “agnellum, haedillum me tuom dic esse vel vitellum” (“say I am your little lamb, your little kid or your calf”).^[4]

Semantic evolution

The word stayed rare in Classical Latin; after Plautus it appears mainly in the grammarians, such as Priscian and Pompeius, and in Cassiodorus.^[4][3] In the Late Roman period it is found in inscriptions from Rome and northern Italy, dated between AD 271 and 600.^[7]

In Christian and medieval Latin it was the ordinary word for a little lamb,^[8][9] used in charters and estate lists such as the formulary of Marculf,^[9][10] and figuratively of Christ, of the saints and of a pupil.^[9] It lives on in Italian agnello and French agneau.^[3]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it as a term of endearment in the Asinaria.^[6][4][10]
• 271–600 AD – It appears in sixteen inscriptions, mostly from Rome and northern Italy.^[7]

Meanings

Noun

1. A little lamb, lambkin.^[1][6]
2. (as a term of endearment) Little lamb, darling.^[4][2]
3. (Medieval Latin, figurative) Christ, or a saint, as the Lamb; a pupil or charge.^[9]

Word family

• agnella

References

1. ^ a b c Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
2. ^ a b c d Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
3. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
5. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b Kaše, Vojtěch; Heřmánková, Petra; Sobotková, Adéla et al. (2024), LIST: Latin Inscriptions in Space and Time, v1.2 (EDCS + EDH), Aarhus: SDAM, doi:10.5281/zenodo.10473706
8. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
9. ^ a b c d Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
10. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de