Etymologically
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construo

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Pronunciation

  • IPA (Classical): [ˈkõː.stru.oː][1]
  • IPA (Ecclesiastical): [ˈkɔn.stru.o][1]

Forms

cōnstruō (present infinitive cōnstruere, perfect active cōnstrūxī, supine cōnstrūctum); third conjugation[1]

Etymology

It is from con- (“together”) and struō “to pile up, arrange”.[2][1][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The OLD's first citations are from Cicero, of heaping up money and arranging things.[2][4] Köbler dates Cicero 81–43 BC.[5]

Semantic evolution

It meant to heap up, as Cicero's heaps of coins, to make by piling up, and to load, as in Catullus.[2][4] It meant to place together, arrange, as Cicero's teeth set in rows in the mouth, and to build, construct.[2][6] It also meant to amass a store, as in Horace, and in Apuleius to devise plans.[2] In Late Latin it took the grammatical sense “to relate words”.[3]

In Ecclesiastical Latin it meant to build, frame together.[7] French construire and Spanish construir are borrowings.[1] English construe came in the late 14th century from its grammatical sense, English construct in the 1660s from its participle, and English construction from cōnstrūctiō.[3]

Timeline

  • 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of heaping up and arranging.[2][5]
  • 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus uses it of loading.[2][5]
  • 65–8 BC – Horace uses it of amassing.[2][5]
  • late 14th century – English construe is recorded.[3]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To heap up, pile up.[2]
  2. To arrange, place together.[2]
  3. To build, construct.[2]
  4. To amass.[2]
  5. To devise (plans).[2]

Word family

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 k l m Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  5. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  6. ^ Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
  7. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson