amputo

Forms

amputō (present infinitive amputāre, perfect active amputāvī, supine amputātum); first conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin ambi- + putō (“to prune”);^[2][3] Festus, as epitomized by Paul the Deacon, explains ⟨amputata⟩ as “pruned around”.^[4] De Vaan takes putō from the adjective putus (“clean, pure”): it first meant to cut off unwanted branches, whence “to reckon, think”; the adjective goes back to Proto-Italic *putos and Proto-Indo-European *pHu-tó-.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its first example in the OLD is in Lucilius, of cutting off both testicles.^[2]

Semantic evolution

It is to cut off a limb, a branch or anything that projects, as in Horace's pruning of useless branches with a hook, and to prune or cut back a plant, as Cicero's vine that the farmer keeps in check with the knife.^[2][4] Figuratively it is to prune away faults, as Cicero's young man in whom there is something to cut back, to take away or cut off, and to cut down a number or shorten a speech.^[2] Seneca uses it of cutting bodies in pieces.^[2]

Church Latin glosses it “cut off, amputate, take away, remove”.^[6]

Timeline

• c. 180–102 BC – Lucilius of cutting off a limb.^[2][7]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero of pruning vines and faults.^[2][7]
• 65–8 BC – Horace of pruning branches.^[2][7]
• 1630s – Its past participle gives English amputate.^[8]

Meanings

Verb

1. To cut off, lop off; to amputate a limb.^[2][4][1]
2. To prune, cut back a plant; to cut in pieces.^[2][4][1]
3. To remove, eradicate faults; to take away; to cut short, curtail.^[2][4][1]

Word family

• amputātiō
• sēmiamputātus

Related words

• putō
• English amputate

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
6. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
7. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
8. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com