amurca

Forms

amurca f (genitive amurcae); first declension^[1] It is also spelled amurga.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek ἀμόργη (amórgē, “lees of oil”), perhaps through Etruscan.^[2][3][4][1] Köbler connects the Greek word with the root Proto-Indo-European *merǵ- (“to wipe off”).^[5] Isidore derived it from ēmergō (“to emerge”), adding that the Greeks had their own name for it.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Lewis & Short's first author is Cato, in his work on farming.^[3]

Semantic evolution

It is the watery fluid in the olive besides the oil, the lees of oil, as opposed to the solid residue, fracēs.^[2][3][1] Cato, Varro, Columella and Pliny the Elder discuss its uses in farming, and Virgil mentions it in the Georgics.^[3] Servius comments on it in his notes on Virgil.^[3][5]

Timeline

• 234–149 BC – Cato in his work on farming.^[3][5]
• 116–27 BC – Varro on farming.^[3][5]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil in the Georgics.^[3][5]
• c. 560–636 AD – Isidore on its name.^[4][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. The watery part pressed out of olives besides the oil, the lees or dregs of oil.^[2][3][1]

Word family

• amurcarius
• examurgō

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ a b c d 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