Etymologically
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aucupium

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Forms

aucupium n (genitive aucupiī or aucupī); second declension[1] A by-form ⟨aucipium⟩ is attributed to Caesar.[2][3]

Etymology

It is from Latin auceps (“bird-catcher”) + -ium.[4][1][3] De Vaan lists it among the derivatives of avis (“bird”): auceps comes from ⟨*au̯i-kaps⟩ “bird-taker”, and the latter goes back to Proto-Italic *awi- (“bird”) and Proto-Indo-European *h2eu-i- (“bird”).[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is found first in Plautus, used figuratively: in the Miles gloriosus a woman is said to hunt with her eyes and go fowling with her ears.[4][2][5]

Semantic evolution

Its literal sense is bird-catching or fowling:[4][6] Cicero has a man who kept himself alive by fowling, and Pliny the Elder peoples who live on hunting and fowling.[4][7] Columella uses it of catching a swarm of bees.[4][2] By metonymy it named the game birds caught, wildfowl, as in Catullus and Celsus.[4][2]

Figuratively it was a sly hunt for something:[4] Terence has a character call a new way of making a living a new kind of fowling, Cicero speaks of an anxious seeking after charm in style, and aucupia verbōrum were quibbles over words.[4][2][7]

Timeline

  • c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it figuratively of listening for something.[4][8]
  • 190–159 BC – Terence calls a new way of living a new kind of fowling.[4][8]
  • 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of fowling and of seeking after charm in style.[4][8]
  • 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus uses it of wildfowl.[4][8]
  • 1st century AD – Columella uses it of catching bees.[4][8]

Meanings

Noun

  1. Fowling, bird-catching; also the catching of a swarm of bees.[4][6]
  2. Game birds, wildfowl.[4][2]
  3. (figurative) A sly hunting after something;[4][2] aucupia verbōrum, quibbles over words.[4][2]

References

  1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
  3. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  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 Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
  8. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de