coloro

Forms

colōrō (present infinitive colōrāre, perfect active colōrāvī, supine colōrātum); first conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin color (“colour”) + -ō,^[2][3][4] a verb made from the noun.^[5] De Vaan traces color, older colōs, to Proto-Italic *kelōs- (“outside, aspect”) and Proto-Indo-European *ḱel-ōs (“cover, covering”); in Latin the noun shifted from “covering” to “colour”.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan and the TLL find it first in Cato,^[5][6] who in the De agri cultura uses it of food browned in the cooking.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Cicero has it of giving colour to bodies, in the De natura deorum, and of being tanned by the sun: in the De oratore he says that walking in the sun browns a man even when he walks for another reason.^[2][7] Vitruvius uses it of water dyed with violets,^[2] and the Elder Seneca of painting the cheeks.^[4]

From the start it was also used of style and character: eloquence, Cicero writes in the Orator, gives itself colour and strength.^[2][8] Seneca the Younger opposes what is merely coloured to what is deeply dyed in the mind,^[7][8] and says of a friend's letters that they are neither feigned nor “coloured”, that is, not given a false gloss;^[2] in the rhetorical schools it meant to make a case look fair, to put a good face on it.^[2]

Medieval writers kept the senses of dyeing and painting;^[9] Aldhelm uses it of fleeces dyed with purple.^[9] Ecclesiastical Latin also used it for glossing over something.^[10]

Timeline

• 234–149 BC – Cato uses it of browning food in cooking.^[2][11]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of colouring bodies, of tanning, and of style.^[2][11]
• c. 84–c. 25 BC – Vitruvius uses it of water dyed with violets.^[2][11]
• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca uses it of giving a false gloss to words.^[2][11]
• 639–709 AD – Aldhelm uses it of fleeces dyed purple.^[9][11]

Meanings

Verb

1. To give colour to, to tinge.^[2][12]
2. To dye; to paint or rouge the face.^[2][4]
3. To make darker in colour, as by ripening or baking.^[2]
4. To tan, make sunburnt.^[2][7]
5. (figurative) To give a particular character to, to “colour” (style, speech).^[2][8]
6. To give a deceptive gloss to;^[2] (rhetoric) to make a case look fair, make specious.^[2]
7. (Ecclesiastical Latin) To give tone to; to gloss over.^[10]

Word family

• colorabilis
• colōrātor
• concolorans
• dēcolōrō
• colōrātus

Related words

• color

References

1. ^ a b c 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 r Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Bianchi, Rossella; Lelli, Olga (2014), VOLI: Vocabolario di latino, Florence: Le Monnier
4. ^ a b c Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
5. ^ a b c de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
6. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
7. ^ a b c Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
8. ^ a b c Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
9. ^ a b c Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
10. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
11. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
12. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press