concremo

Forms

concremō (present infinitive concremāre, perfect active concremāvī, supine concremātum); first conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin con- + cremō (“to burn”).^[2][3][1] De Vaan thinks cremō is probably a denominative verb, but finds no convincing further connection.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL notes that it is first found in Livy,^[3] who uses it of people burnt alive and of houses and cities burnt down.^[5][6]

Semantic evolution

The verb meant to burn up completely, to burn down, and also to burn things together.^[2] L&S doubts that it was used before the Augustan period,^[5] and the TLL observes that among the poets only Seneca's tragedies have it, twice.^[3] In Ecclesiastical Latin it keeps the sense “to burn up, consume”.^[7]

Timeline

• 59 BC–AD 17 – Livy uses it of burning people, weapons, houses and cities.^[5][3][6]
• 4 BC–AD 65 – Seneca uses it twice in his tragedies.^[3][6]
• c. 75–c. 150 AD – Suetonius uses it of burning written records.^[5][6]

Meanings

Verb

1. To consume by fire, burn completely, burn down.^[2][5]
2. To burn together.^[2]

Word family

• concrematio

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e 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 d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson