Etymologically
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bipalium

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [bɪˈpaː.li.ũː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [biˈpaː.li.um][1]

Forms

bipālium n (genitive bipāliī or bipālī); second declension[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin bi- (“two, double”) + pāla (“spade”) + -ium.[2][1][3] Georges compares bisellium (“seat for two”), formed in the same way from sella (“seat”).[4] De Vaan lists pāla (“long-handled spade”) among the derivatives of pangō (“to fasten, fix”) and derives it from an instrument noun Proto-Italic *pāg-slo- (“spade, pole”); the verb goes back to Proto-Indo-European *ph₂-n-ǵ- (“to attach”).[5] Cognate with Ancient Greek πήγνυμι (pḗgnumi, “to fix, join”).[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL's earliest citations are from Cato's farm manual, which says that a place should be worked with the double spade so that the soil is soft, and tells the farmer to turn the earth with it.[3][6]

Semantic evolution

It was a farm tool for deep digging or trenching, a double spade or mattock.[2][6] Varro, Columella and Pliny the Elder use it in the same phrases as Cato, of breaking up ground or new land with it.[6][3][4] By metonymy it also meant the depth of such digging, two spits deep: Columella has soil dug to a double spade's depth, and Pliny ground trenched three feet deep with a deep bipalium.[4][6] An ancient glossary explains it as an iron farm tool.[3]

Timeline

  • 234–149 BC – Cato uses it of turning the earth.[3][7]
  • 116–27 BC – Varro uses it in his work on farming.[6][7]
  • 1st century AD – Columella uses it of soil dug to a double spade's depth.[4][7]
  • 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it of deep trenching.[4][7]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A double spade or mattock, for digging deep or trenching.[2][6]
  2. (by metonymy) The depth of a double spit.[4]

References

  1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  4. ^ a b c d e f Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
  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 c d e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de