Etymologically
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ceu

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ˈkɛu̯][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [ˈt͡ʃɛːu̯][1]

Forms

ceu (particle)[2][1]

Etymology

It goes back to Proto-Italic *keiwe.[3][1] Following Watkins, de Vaan explains it from the particle Proto-Indo-European *ḱe (“here”), the ⟨-ce⟩ of hic, and Proto-Indo-European *h₁i-we (“as”), comparing Sanskrit इव (iva, “like, as”);[3][2] Walde and Hofmann had assumed ⟨*kei⟩ “here” and ⟨*we⟩ “or”.[3][2] Its final vowel was lost early, as in seu beside sīve.[3][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan dates it from Ennius,[3] whose Annals have a girl who blushed “like milk and purple mixed”.[2]

Semantic evolution

It introduces similes and comparisons, “as, like”, with a noun or a clause, as in Lucretius' many images.[2] With the subjunctive it is “as if”, often in rejecting a suggestion, and with single words, as Ovid's “she was stunned as if turned to stone”.[2] Pliny the Elder uses it for “so to speak” and “as for example”, as animals that live underground, like moles.[2] Lewis & Short note that before the Augustan age it belongs to elevated poetry.[4]

Church Latin glosses it “as, like, as when, as it were”; in medieval texts it is sometimes used for seu.[5][6]

Timeline

  • 204–169 BC – Ennius of a blush.[2][3][7]
  • 96–55 BC – Lucretius in similes.[2][7]
  • 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid of a woman stunned as if turned to stone.[2][7]
  • 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder in the sense “as for example”.[2][7]

Meanings

Particle

  1. As, like, just as.[2][4][1]
  2. With the subjunctive, as if.[2][5]
  3. As it were, so to speak; as for example.[2][5]
  4. (Medieval Latin) Or, used for seu.[6]

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 Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  4. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  5. ^ a b c Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
  6. ^ a b Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
  7. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de