Etymologically
Log in

circumvolito

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 20 October 2026 at 20:23. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Pronunciation

  • Classical: [kɪr.kʊmˈwɔ.lɪ.toː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [t͡ʃir.kumˈvɔː.li.to][1]

Forms

circumvolitō (present infinitive circumvolitāre, perfect active circumvolitāvī, supine circumvolitātum); first conjugation[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin circum- (“around”) + volitō (“to fly about”);[2][1] the TLL compares circumvolō (“to fly around”).[3] De Vaan lists volitō among the derivatives of volō2 (“to fly”); following Muller, he allows it to go back to Proto-Indo-European *gʷelh₁-ie/o- (“to raise the arm, throw”), with a shift of meaning from raising the arm to flying, a link that Walde and Hofmann rejected.[4] Cognate, if so, with Ancient Greek βάλλω (bállō, “to throw”).[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL finds the compound from Lucilius on,[3] who has a figpecker and thrushes flying about.[2][5]

Semantic evolution

It means to fly round about, without an object.[2][6] Virgil uses it in tmesis, with Rumour flying far and wide, and Tacitus of birds flying round;[2][3] Lucretius, Seneca and Silius Italicus use it of horsemen riding about or of a horse's hoof.[2][5] With an object it means to fly round or about something: a swallow that has flown round the lakes, a line the OLD cites from Varro of Atax and Lewis and Short from Virgil's Georgics;[2][6] Pliny the Elder writes of swifts that do not fly round ships, and Horace asks a poet friend what thyme he is flitting about.[2]

Of people it means to hover around or frequent a place: Columella mocks the hired greeter who flits about the thresholds of the powerful, and Silius uses it of a lictor.[2][5] Martianus Capella uses it of breezes.[7]

Timeline

  • c. 180–102 BC – Lucilius uses it of birds flying about.[2][8]
  • 96–55 BC – Lucretius uses it of horsemen.[2][8]
  • 65–8 BC – Horace uses it of flitting about thyme.[2][8]
  • 1st century AD – Columella uses it of a client flitting about doorways.[2][8]
  • 98–115 AD – Tacitus uses it of birds flying round.[2][8]

Meanings

Verb

  1. (intransitive) To fly round about;[2][6] (of horsemen) to ride about.[2][6]
  2. (transitive) To fly round, flit about over.[2][7]
  3. (of persons) To hover around, frequent.[2][5]

References

  1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c 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. ^ a b c d Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
  6. ^ a b c d Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
  8. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de