conitor

Forms

cōnītor (present infinitive cōnītī, perfect active cōnīsus sum or cōnīxus sum); third conjugation, deponent^[1] Also connītor, the less correct spelling.^[2][3] Accius has the infinitive cōnītier.^[2] The perfect participle is cōnīxus in Plautus, Cicero, Lucretius, Virgil, Ovid and Livy, and cōnīsus in Livy, Valerius Maximus, Seneca and Tacitus.^[2]

Etymology

It is from Latin con- + nītor¹ (“to lean on, strive”).^[2][1][4] For nītor¹ de Vaan reconstructs Proto-Italic *kniχw-et-, whose first sense may have been “to lean on” or “to exert pressure”, and connects it with cōnīveō (“to close the eyes”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus has it first, in the Miles gloriosus: “if you had put your strength into it, your arm would have gone right through the elephant's hide”.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

It is to make a great physical effort, to strain: Virgil has a spear hurled with the whole body's strain, and Livy three young men straining to uproot a tree and pack animals breaking through the snow as they struggled.^[2] Virgil uses it of a she-goat giving birth to twins on bare rock.^[2] It is also to struggle towards a place: Caesar has cavalry struggling up a ridge, and Tacitus a man climbing a tall tree.^[2] Curtius has men unable to raise themselves from the ground for cold.^[6] In mental effort it is to strive or endeavour: Cicero urges striving with the mind as hard as one can, and says reason, striving on by itself, becomes perfect virtue;^[2] Curtius says one must strive to be worthy of such friends, and Tacitus has Nero trying to dig through the hills by Lake Avernus.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus, of straining one's strength.^[2][7]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero, of mental effort.^[2][7]
• c. 50 BC – Caesar, of cavalry struggling uphill.^[2][7]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil, of a goat giving birth.^[2][7]
• 98–115 AD – Tacitus, of Nero's digging.^[2][7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To make a great physical effort, strain, struggle; of animals, to labour in giving birth.^[2][6][1]
2. To struggle towards a place, climb.^[2]
3. To strive, endeavour.^[2][1]

Related words

• nītor¹
• adnītor
• ēnītor
• obnītor

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 o p q r Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b 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 Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de