calvaria

Forms

calvāria f (genitive calvāriae); first declension^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin calvus (“bald”) + -āria.^[2][1] The TLL derives it from calva (“bald head; scalp”) or from the adjective, and de Vaan lists it, with calva, among the derivatives of calvus.^[3][4] The adjective goes back to Proto-Italic *kale/owo-, from Proto-Indo-European *klH-e/ou̯o- (“bald”).^[4]

Isidore of Seville explains that the skull was named from the bald bones, by a loss of hair, and that it was also used as a neuter.^[5][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler finds it first in Varro.^[6] The TLL also quotes a fragment of the historian Gnaeus Gellius in which the bone of a skull is cleaned and gilded.^[3]

Semantic evolution

It was the skull of a person or an animal.^[7][8] Celsus describes the human skull in his work on medicine, noting that it is rarely solid, without sutures.^[3][7] Skulls had their place in folk medicine and magic: Scribonius Largus and Pliny the Elder record remedies made from the skull of a dead man or the ashes of a mad dog's skull,^[3] Apuleius puts skulls among a witch's things,^[3][9] and Palladius advises setting a mare's skull in a garden.^[3][7]

In the Vulgate the place of the crucifixion, Golgotha, is Calvāriae locus, the place of the skull, rendering Greek κρανίον (kraníon).^[3][7] Jerome concluded that it was a place of beheading, not the tomb of the first man,^[3] and a commentary on the Psalms ascribed to Rufinus says criminals were shaved and beheaded there.^[3] English Calvary comes from it.^[10]

In medieval Latin it also meant the punishment of shaving a person's head, and a calvary, after the place; the MLW also records it for baldness.^[11][12][13] Spanish calavera continues it.^[3]

Timeline

• 116–27 BC – Varro uses it, according to Köbler.^[6]
• 14–37 AD – Celsus describes the human skull.^[3][6]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder records remedies made from skulls.^[3][6]
• 390–406 AD – The Vulgate calls Golgotha Calvāriae locus.^[3][6]
• late 14th century – English borrows Calvary.^[10]

Meanings

Noun

1. The skull (of a person or an animal).^[2][7][8]
2. (Ecclesiastical Latin) Calvāriae locus or Calvāria, Golgotha, Calvary.^[7][14][3]
3. (Medieval Latin) Tonsure as a punishment, the shaving of the head.^[11][13]
4. (Medieval Latin) Baldness.^[12]

Word family

• calvāriola

Related words

• calvus
• English Calvary

Usage notes

The OLD gives a separate neuter plural calvāria for skulls, in Apuleius, and for a kind of fish, in a fragment of Ennius and in Apuleius' Apology.^[2][3] Glosses and a manuscript of the Itala also have a neuter calvārium.^[3]

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 f g h i j k l m n o p q Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ 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
5. ^ Isidore of Seville, Etymologiarum sive Originum libri XX, ed. W. M. Lindsay (Oxford, 1911).
6. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ a b c d e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
9. ^ Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
10. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
11. ^ a b Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
12. ^ a b Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
13. ^ a b du Cange, Charles du Fresne, et al. (1883–1887), Glossarium mediae et infimae latinitatis, augmented ed. by Léopold Favre, Niort: L. Favre
14. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson