baculum

Pronunciation

• IPA (Classical): [ˈba.kʊ.ɫũː]^[1]
• IPA (Ecclesiastical): [ˈbaː.ku.lum]^[1]

Forms

baculum n (genitive baculī); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It goes back to Proto-Italic *bak-(k)elo-.^[2] De Vaan notes that several languages have words in *bak- for a staff or peg: Old Irish bacc (“hook, crooked staff”), Welsh bach, Ancient Greek βάκτρον (báktron, “stick, staff”) and Germanic words such as Middle English pegge (“peg”).^[2][1] Since *b was very rare in Proto-Indo-European and the Celtic forms have an unexplained double consonant, he takes them all to be borrowings from an unidentified source.^[2][1] Pokorny and Köbler set up a root Proto-Indo-European *bak- (“staff”).^[3][4] Older dictionaries derived it from the root of Ancient Greek βαίνω (baínō, “to go”), as a stick for walking.^[5][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan and Köbler date it from Cicero onwards.^[2][4] In the Verrines Cicero uses it of a lictor's rod, turned round to beat a man in the eyes.^[7][5]

Semantic evolution

Its basic sense was a staff or walking stick, unlike scipio, a staff carried for show, and fustis, a stick for beating, although later writers used it for all of these.^[5] It named the augur's crooked staff, the lituus,^[7][5] and a king's sceptre, including the sceptre of a stage king.^[7][5] With pera “wallet” it was the badge of the Cynic philosophers.^[5][8] A masculine form baculus appears from Augustan times.^[5][9]

In the Vulgate the staff became a figure of support,^[8] and Ecclesiastical Latin used it for a crook or rod.^[10]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it for a lictor's rod.^[7][4]
• 59 BC–17 AD – Livy uses it for the augur's staff and for the stick with which Tarquin struck off poppy heads.^[7][4]
• 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid has the masculine baculus.^[5][4]
• c. 75–c. 150 AD – Suetonius mentions the sceptre of a stage king.^[7][4]
• 390–406 AD – The Vulgate uses baculus for a pilgrim's staff and, figuratively, for a support.^[5][8][4]

Meanings

Noun

1. A staff, walking stick.^[7][5]
2. A lictor's rod.^[7]
3. A sceptre.^[7][5]
4. The augur's crooked staff, the lituus.^[7][5]
5. (Ecclesiastical Latin) A rod, crook; figuratively, a support.^[10][8]

Word family

• bacillum
• bacillus
• baculāris
• imbēcillus

Usage notes

The diminutive bacillum “little stick” gave the New Latin bacillus, and imbecillus “weak” was explained already in ancient scholia as “without a staff”.^[2][1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
3. ^ Pokorny, Julius (1959), Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Bern; Munich: Francke
4. ^ a b c d e f g Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
9. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
10. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson