Etymologically
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camelus

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [kaˈmeː.ɫʊs][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [kaˈmɛː.lus][1]

Forms

camēlus m (genitive camēlī, feminine camēla); second declension[1] It is also spelled camellus.[2] It is sometimes feminine.[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek κάμηλος (kámēlos, “camel”), itself of Semitic origin.[2][1][4] Wiktionary compares Arabic جَمَل (jamal) and Biblical Hebrew גָּמָל (gāmāl).[1] Varro says the camel came to Latium under its Syrian name.[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL finds it first in Pomponius' farces, which spell it camellus.[5][2] It notes that Sallust had the Romans first see camels in 74 BC, in the war with Mithridates, which Plutarch rightly disputed.[5]

Semantic evolution

It is a camel or dromedary, with one hump or two, in Varro, Cicero, Livy, Horace, Pliny the Elder and Tacitus.[3][2] Livy and Curtius call the swift ones dromadēs.[2] It is sometimes feminine, as in Pliny and the Vulgate, and there is also a feminine camēla.[3] Stelten gives “camel”.[6] English camel goes back to Old English, from this Latin word.[7]

Timeline

  • 116–27 BC – Varro, on the camel's Syrian name.[5][3][4]
  • 81–43 BC – Cicero, in the De natura deorum.[3][4]
  • 59 BC–17 AD – Livy, of dromedaries.[2][4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A camel or dromedary.[2][3][1][6]

Word family

  • camēla
  • camelarius
  • camēlīnus
  • camēlopardalis
  • strūthocamēlus
  • English camel

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  4. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  5. ^ a b c d Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  6. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
  7. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com