Etymologically
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aulaeum

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Forms

aulaeum n (genitive aulaeī); second declension[1] It is also spelled auleum.[2]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek αὐλαία (aulaía, “curtain”), remade in Latin.[3][2][1] Köbler connects the Greek word with αὐλή (aulḗ, “courtyard, hall”).[4] Servius explained the name from the hall of Attalus, where large curtains were said to have first been made.[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The OLD's first citation is Lucilius, who has a call to draw the curtains.[3] Köbler dates it from Cicero.[4]

Semantic evolution

In the plural it is curtains, hangings or tapestries:[3] Varro calls it a foreign kind of cloth, Sallust has a house adorned with hangings, and Virgil's queen takes her place among proud hangings.[5][3] Juvenal uses it ironically of a gaudy toga.[3] In the theatre it is the curtain, which was lowered to reveal the stage and raised at the end:[3] Cicero has aulaeum tollitur at the end of a play, Horace a curtain kept down for four hours or more, and Phaedrus and Apuleius the curtain let down.[3] Apuleius also speaks figuratively of drawing aside the tragic curtain and speaking plainly.[3] Stelten gives "hanging, canopy, curtain" for Church Latin.[6]

Timeline

  • c. 180–102 BC – Lucilius of curtains.[3]
  • 116–27 BC – Varro of a foreign cloth.[5][3]
  • 81–43 BC – Cicero of the theatre curtain.[3][4]
  • 70–19 BC – Virgil of hangings.[3]
  • 65–8 BC – Horace of a performance of four hours or more.[3]

Meanings

Noun

  1. The curtain of a theatre.[3][5][1]
  2. (plural) Curtains, hangings, tapestries; a canopy.[3][5][1][6]

References

  1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  4. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  5. ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson