coccum

Pronunciation

• IPA (Classical): [ˈkɔk.kũː]^[1]
• IPA (Ecclesiastical): [ˈkɔk.kum]^[1]

Forms

coccum n (genitive coccī); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek κόκκος (kókkos, “grain, seed, berry”).^[2][1][3] A masculine form coccus is found in Jerome, Rufinus and other later writers.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Horace, in the Satires, has a cloth dyed with red scarlet.^[2][4] Köbler dates Horace 65–8 BC.^[5]

Semantic evolution

It was the kermes insect of the scarlet oak, which the ancients took for a berry or gall, and the scarlet dye made from it.^[2][6] Pliny describes the scarlet berry, and Georges notes that the word first meant a kernel or berry.^[6][7] By metonymy it meant scarlet cloth or a scarlet garment, as in Suetonius' life of Nero and in Silius Italicus.^[2][4] Coccum Cnidium was the berry of spurge flax, used in medicine by Celsus.^[2]

It is also found in the Vulgate, and Köbler gives the sense of scarlet thread.^[5] Medieval Latin kept the senses of kermes, scarlet colour and precious scarlet cloth.^[8] Through Old French coque “shell” it lies behind French cocon, the source of English cocoon in the 1690s.^[9]

Timeline

• 65–8 BC – Horace mentions cloth dyed with scarlet.^[2][5]
• 14–37 AD – Celsus uses coccum Cnidium in medicine.^[2][5]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder describes the scarlet berry.^[6][5]
• 1690s – English cocoon is recorded, from its French descendant.^[9]

Meanings

Noun

1. The kermes insect, taken for a berry; the scarlet dye made from it.^[2][1]
2. Scarlet cloth or a scarlet garment.^[2][4]
3. coccum Cnidium, the berry of spurge flax.^[2]

Word family

• coccinus

Related words

• English cocoon
• English coccus

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 Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
5. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
8. ^ Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
9. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com