Etymologically
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bimembris

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [bɪˈmɛm.brɪs][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [biˈmɛm.bris][1]

Forms

bimembris (neuter bimembre); third-declension two-termination adjective[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin bi- (“two”) + membrum (“limb”) + -is.[2][1][3] Membrum goes back to Proto-Italic *memsro- and Proto-Indo-European *mēms-ro- (“body-part, meaty part”).[4] The TLL compares bicorpor (“two-bodied”).[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The earliest example in Lewis & Short is Virgil's use of bimembrēs as a noun for the cloud-born Centaurs, half man and half horse.[5][6]

Semantic evolution

The word meant having limbs of two different kinds, part human and part animal.[2] It was above all a poetic epithet of the Centaurs, used by Ovid, Silius Italicus and Statius,[5] and Juvenal applies it to a monstrous child, half man and half beast.[5] The Latin glossaries explain bimembrēs as the Centaurs.[3]

Timeline

  • 70–19 BC – Virgil calls the Centaurs bimembrēs.[5][6]
  • 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid uses it in the Heroides and the Metamorphoses.[5][6]
  • 25–101 AD – Silius Italicus speaks of “Centauri bimembres”.[5][6]
  • c. 67–c. 127 AD – Juvenal uses it of a child born half man, half beast.[5][6]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. Having limbs of two kinds, part human and part beast.[2][5]

Noun

  1. (masculine plural) The Centaurs.[2][5]

References

  1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  4. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de