circumcisus

Forms

circumcīsus (feminine circumcīsa, neuter circumcīsum); first/second-declension adjective^[1][2]

Etymology

Used as an adjective, it is the perfect passive participle from Latin circumcīdō (“to cut around”).^[1][3][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is found from Cicero on,^[4] meaning “sheer on all sides”: in the Verrines he describes the town of Henna as cut off steeply from every approach.^[1][2]

Semantic evolution

Caesar uses it of a hill ex omni parte circumcisus, steep on every side.^[1][2] From the idea of something cut back, Seneca and Pliny the Younger use it for “limited, short”, Pliny asking what is so cut short as the longest human life.^[1][5] Of style it meant “concise”: Quintilian equates it with Greek σύντομος, and Pliny the Younger calls the speeches of the Gracchi and Cato concise and brief.^[1][2]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of a town steep on all sides.^[1][4]
• c. 50 BC – Caesar uses it of a steep hill.^[1][4]
• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca uses it of limited baggage.^[1][4]
• c. 35–95/96 AD – Quintilian uses it of a concise statement of facts.^[1][4]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Sheer or steep on all sides.^[1][2]
2. Restricted, limited, short.^[1][5]
3. (of style) concise, free of superfluities.^[1][2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
2. ^ a b c d e f g Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
3. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.