citatus

Forms

citātus (feminine citāta, neuter citātum, comparative citātior, superlative citātissimus); first/second-declension adjective^[1][2]

Etymology

It is the past participle of citō (“to set in motion, summon”), used as an adjective.^[1][2] citō is the frequentative of cieō (“to set in motion”), which it replaced in Classical Latin; that verb goes back to Proto-Indo-European *(ḱ)ei(h₂)- (“to start to move”).^[3] Cognate with Ancient Greek κίνυμαι (kínumai, “to be moved”).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its first example in the OLD is Accius' “check the speeding force of the horses”.^[1]

Semantic evolution

It means driven to speed, of living creatures, and moved quickly, of limbs, as in Catullus' “when he reached the grove eagerly with hurried foot”.^[1] Of things it is rapid, as Seneca's whirl of the universe, and of the bowels loose; of events it is early, as a young man's death on an inscription.^[1]

Church Latin glosses it “swift, rapid, hurried”.^[4]

Timeline

• 170–c. 90 BC – Accius of speeding horses.^[1][5]
• 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus of a hurried foot.^[1][5]
• c. 50 BC – Caesar.^[5]
• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca of rapid movement.^[1][5]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Driven fast, hurried, quickened.^[1][2]
2. Rapid, swift; of the bowels, loose.^[1][4]
3. Of events, coming early.^[1]

Related words

• citō
• cieō
• citus

Usage notes

Sallust has a noun citātus, -ūs, “impulse”, of winds rushing through the hollows of the earth.^[1][6]

References

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