almus

Forms

almus (feminine alma, neuter almum); first/second-declension adjective^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Italic *almo- (“fostering”), inherited from Proto-Indo-European *h₂(e)l-mo-, from the root of alō (“to feed, nourish”).^[2][3][1] De Vaan gives the root as Proto-Indo-European *h₂el- (“to feed, raise”), cognate with Ancient Greek ἄναλτος (ánaltos, “insatiable”) and Gothic 𐌰𐌻𐌰𐌽 (alan, “to grow up”).^[2]

Festus explained ⟨alma⟩ as “holy or beautiful, or nourishing, from feeding”.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler gives Plautus as its first author;^[5] Ennius has “O kindly Faith” in his tragedies.^[3]

Semantic evolution

It is first nourishing or fostering, of a nurse or the breast, as Lucretius' coaxing talk of a kindly nurse, and life-giving, of the earth, daylight and the like.^[3][6] As an epithet of deities, especially goddesses such as Ceres and Venus, and of priestesses, it is kindly or gracious, with a genitive “kindly mother of”, and it is used of abstract things, as Lucretius' kindly sweetness and Horace's day that first smiled with kindly glory.^[3][6][1]

In Christian and medieval writers it is “holy, kindly, gracious”, as in Almus Spīritus for the Holy Spirit, and alma māter “nourishing mother”.^[1][7] Köbler finds it in Aldhelm, Bede and Hrabanus Maurus.^[5]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus.^[5]
• 204–169 BC – Ennius of kindly Faith.^[3][5]
• 96–55 BC – Lucretius of a nurse's coaxing talk.^[3][5]
• 639–709 AD – Aldhelm.^[5]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Nourishing, fostering; life-giving.^[3][6][1][7]
2. (of deities) Kindly, gracious, propitious.^[3][6][1][7]
3. (of abstract things) Kindly, genial.^[3][6]
4. (Ecclesiastical Latin) Holy; cherished, forgiving, bountiful.^[1][7]

Word family

• almitiēs

Related words

• alō
• alumnus
• alimentum
• English alma mater

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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 e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b c d Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson