Etymologically
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balo

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ˈbaː.ɫoː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [ˈbaː.lo][1]

Forms

bālō (present infinitive bālāre, perfect active bālāvī, supine bālātum); first conjugation, no passive[1] Varro has the spelling baelare (or belare).[2][3][4] A form bēlō is found in glosses.[5]

Etymology

It is onomatopoeic, imitating the bleating of sheep.[5][2][6] Renderings of that sound vary between /aː/ and /eː/ in the Indo-European languages, as in English baa.[5] De Vaan thinks the verb took its suffix from ululō “to howl”, itself a reduplicated sound word;[5] the forms that Walde, Hofmann, Ernout and Meillet compare belong rather with fleō “to weep”.[5] Wiktionary compares Ancient Greek βῆ (bê), the sheep's cry, and bēbō (“to yell”).[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is found from Plautus on,[5][3][7] meaning “to bleat”.[2][3]

Semantic evolution

Besides the plain sense,[2][3] the present participle became a standing epithet of sheep, and as a noun balantes meant simply “sheep”: Ennius has hostiis balantibus, “with bleating victims”, and Lucretius, Virgil and Juvenal follow.[2][3] Varro has the joke satis balasti, “you have bleated enough”, that is, talked enough about sheep.[3][4] The Vulgate uses it of goats.[4]

Arnobius uses it figuratively for talking nonsense,[3][4] a sense also given for Ecclesiastical Latin.[8]

Timeline

  • c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it for bleating.[3][7]
  • 204–169 BC – Ennius calls sacrificial sheep “bleating victims”.[2][7]
  • 116–27 BC – Varro jokes satis balasti.[3][4][7]
  • 96–55 BC – Lucretius uses balantes for sheep.[2][7]
  • 297–310 AD – Arnobius uses it for talking nonsense.[3][4][7]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To bleat, baa.[2][3]
  2. (present participle) Bleating, as an epithet of sheep;[2][3] (plural, as a noun) sheep.[2][3]
  3. To bleat (of goats).[4]
  4. (figurative) To talk nonsense.[3][4][8]

Word family

Usage notes

Varro explained that the sheep's voice sounds like be, so that the Romans said be-lare, which later lost a letter.[6]

References

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