arbuteus

Forms

arbuteus (feminine arbutea, neuter arbuteum); first/second-declension adjective^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin arbutus (“strawberry tree”) + -eus.^[2][1][3] The OLD calls the origin of arbutus unknown;^[2] Lewis and Short connected it with arbor (“tree”), but Schrijver finds no reliable etymology for it.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Virgil is its first author:^[4] in the Georgics he names arbuteae crātēs, hurdles made of arbutus wood, and in the Aeneid arbutus twigs.^[3][5]

Semantic evolution

It means of the arbutus or strawberry tree, or made of its wood.^[2][5] Ovid uses it of the tree's fruit and its leaves, and Statius of its bark.^[3][5] It survives in French arbouse and Spanish alborzo.^[3]

Timeline

• 70–19 BC – Virgil uses it of hurdles and twigs of arbutus.^[3][4]
• 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid uses it of the arbutus fruit.^[5][4]
• c. 45–96 AD – Statius uses it of arbutus bark.^[5][4]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of the arbutus or strawberry tree.^[2][5]
2. Made of arbutus wood.^[2][3]

Related words

• arbutus
• arbutum

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b c d e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press