concresco

Forms

concrēscō (present infinitive concrēscere, perfect active concrēvī, supine concrētum); third conjugation, no passive^[1] Ovid has the syncopated perfect infinitive concresse.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is from Latin con- + crēscō (“to grow”),^[2][4][1] “to grow together”.^[3] De Vaan traces crēscō to Proto-Italic *krē- (“to grow, increase”) and Proto-Indo-European *k(w)reh₁- (“to become bigger, stronger”), with cognates only in Slavic verbs meaning “to heal”.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its first example in the OLD is in Cato the Elder, who says brine should be kept in the sun until it has set solid.^[2]

Semantic evolution

It means to be formed by hardening or condensing, as Cicero's question how blood, bile and bones were formed;^[2] Lucretius uses it of clouds gathering.^[2] Of soft or liquid things it is to thicken, curdle, congeal or freeze.^[2][3][1] It also means to grow organically, as wool in Columella, and to contract, as Propertius' dwarf shrunk into his short limbs.^[2] Church Latin glosses it “grow together, harden, congeal, dry up, increase”.^[6]

Timeline

• 234–149 BC – Cato the Elder of brine setting.^[2][7]
• 96–55 BC – Lucretius of clouds forming.^[2][7]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero of the formation of the body's parts.^[2][7]
• 1st century AD – Columella of wool growing thick.^[2][7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To be formed by hardening or condensing; to grow together, coalesce.^[2][3][6]
2. Of liquids, to congeal, curdle, stiffen, freeze.^[2][3][1]
3. To grow thick; to contract.^[2]

Word family

• concrēmentum
• concrescentia
• concrētiō
• concrētus
• inconcretus

Related words

• crēscō

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
5. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
7. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de