clepsydra

Forms

clepsydra f (genitive clepsydrae); first declension^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek κλεψύδρα (klepsúdra, “water clock”).^[2][3][1] The Greek word is made from the stem of κλέπτω (kléptō, “to steal, to hide”) and ὕδωρ (húdōr, “water”).^[4][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

In Cicero it is the water clock that limited the time of speakers: he says of Pericles that no declaimer had taught him to bark at the clepsydra.^[2][6]

Semantic evolution

It was a vessel with a bottom pierced like a sieve, from which the water fell drop by drop.^[7] Pliny the Elder records that Scipio Nasica first brought the water clock to Rome from Greece.^[7] In the courts each speaker was given a set number of clepsydrae, so the word also became a measure of time, the time one clock took to empty; in Pliny the Younger and Martial a speaker asks for, or is granted, so many clepsydrae.^[2][6][8]

Medieval Latin kept the water clock and added the senses of a spigot or tap, and a funnel.^[9][10][11]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero speaks of an orator taught to bark at the clepsydra.^[2][4]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder tells how the water clock came to Rome.^[7][4]
• 40–102 AD – Martial uses it for the time measured by one clock.^[2][4]
• 807 – The Royal Frankish Annals use it in describing a clock whose hours were measured by water.^[9]
• Middle Ages – British writers use it also for a spigot or tap.^[10]
• 1640s – Borrowed into English for the ancient water clock.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. A water clock, especially as used to limit the time allowed to speakers in court.^[2][8]
2. The time measured by one emptying of such a clock.^[2][6]
3. (Medieval Latin) A spigot, tap or funnel.^[9][10][11]

Word family

• clepsydrarius

Related words

• English clepsydra

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
4. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ a b c Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
7. ^ a b c Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
8. ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b c Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
10. ^ a b c Latham, R. E., D. R. Howlett, R. K. Ashdowne, et al. (1975–2013), Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, London: British Academy / Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill