cavillor

Forms

cavillor (present infinitive cavillārī, perfect active cavillātus sum); first conjugation, deponent^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin cavilla (“jesting, banter”) + -ō, a deponent verb.^[2][1][3]

The origin of cavilla is disputed.^[2][4] The OLD derives it from calvor (“to deceive”),^[2] an explanation already proposed in antiquity; de Vaan finds that it has little to recommend it and suggests instead cavus (“hollow”), since jokes are “unserious” speech,^[4] and Wiktionary follows him, reading it as “hollow speech”.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Cicero is the first to use it:^[2][5] in a letter to Atticus he writes that he now banters and jokes familiarly with a man, familiariter cum ipso cavillor ac iocor, and he tells his brother Quintus that he made fun of someone's bordered toga to great laughter.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

From teasing and mockery it moved to captious arguing: Livy says the tribunes quibbled, and Pliny the Elder uses it of people who argue without grounds.^[2][3][6] Quintilian has it of those who scoff at grammar as thin and dry, and Tacitus of picking at the senators' words.^[2][7] Gellius uses it of Hannibal's witty jest at the court of King Antiochus.^[5]

Later writers used an active form cavillō (Venantius Fortunatus, Priscian), and Apuleius uses the perfect participle in a passive sense.^[6][2] In Ecclesiastical Latin it meant simply to jest.^[8] Through French caviller it gave English cavil in the 1540s;^[9] Italian cavillare and Spanish cavilar come from it too.^[9]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of joking and of mocking.^[2][3][10]
• 59 BC–17 AD – Livy uses it of the tribunes' quibbling.^[2][10]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it of arguing without grounds.^[3][10]
• c. 35–95/96 AD – Quintilian has it of those who mock grammar.^[2][10]
• c. 165 AD – Gellius tells of Hannibal's jest.^[5][10]
• 1540s – English cavil comes from it through French.^[9]

Meanings

Verb

1. To jest, banter.^[2][3]
2. To make fun of, mock (with an accusative).^[2][3]
3. To use sophistry, to quibble.^[2][3]
4. To cavil at, find fault with.^[2][7]
5. (Ecclesiastical Latin) To jest.^[8]

Word family

• cavillābundus
• cavillātiō
• cavillātor
• cavillātrix
• cavillātus
• cavillōsus

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
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. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
6. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
8. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
9. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
10. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de