Etymologically
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conatus

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [koːˈnaː.tʊs][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [koˈnaː.tus][1]

Forms

cōnātus m (genitive cōnātūs); fourth declension[1]

Etymology

It is formed from cōnor (“to try, attempt”) with the noun suffix -tus.[2][3][1] De Vaan derives ⟨cōnor⟩ from Proto-Italic *kōnāje- (“to attempt”); a root ⟨*ḱōn-⟩ “ascent” is uncertain, and he compares Ancient Greek ἐγκονέω (enkonéō, “to be quick and active”) and Ancient Greek διάκονος (diákonos, “servant”).[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Terence is its first author,[5][2] whose Heauton timorumenos has a man who “will speak great nonsense with great effort”.[2][6]

Semantic evolution

It is an effort or attempt, including physical effort, and an instinctive impulse: Cicero reports that the Stoics define love as “an impulse to form a friendship arising from the appearance of beauty”.[2] It is also an attempted action or design, as Cicero's hidden plots revealed to the people, and an attempted blow.[2][6]

Church Latin glosses it “attempt”.[7] In medieval Latin cōnātus also stands for cognātus, “kinsman”.[8]

Timeline

  • 190–159 BC – Terence of great effort.[2][5]
  • 81–43 BC – Cicero of an impulse and of plots.[2][5]

Meanings

Noun

  1. An effort, exertion, attempt; physical effort.[2][6][1]
  2. An instinctive impulse.[2]
  3. An attempted action, design; an attempted blow.[2]
  • cōnor
  • cōnāmen
  • English conation

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. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  4. ^ 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 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. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
  8. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill