contremo

Forms

contremō (present infinitive contremere, perfect active contremuī); third conjugation, no passive, no supine stem^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin con- + tremō (“to tremble”).^[2][1][3] De Vaan traces the simple verb to Proto-Italic *trem-e/o- and Proto-Indo-European *tr(e)m- (“to tremble”), and compares Ancient Greek τρέμω (trémō, “to tremble”) and Lithuanian trìmti (“to tremble”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in Pacuvius, in the line caelum tonitru contremit, “the sky quakes with thunder”, quoted by Cicero.^[5][3][6]

Semantic evolution

It is a rare word for trembling all over or violently:^[2][5] Lucretius uses it of the parched earth quaking under the stroke of a thunderbolt,^[5][3] and the TLL records it in Seneca and in Tiberius Claudius Donatus' commentary on the Aeneid.^[3] Martianus Capella uses it transitively, “to fear”.^[7] Georges assigns the perfect forms to contremīscō.^[8] In Ecclesiastical Latin it keeps the sense “to tremble”.^[9]

Timeline

• 220–130 BC – Pacuvius uses it of the sky quaking with thunder.^[3][6]
• 96–55 BC – Lucretius uses it of the earth trembling at a thunderbolt.^[5][6]
• 5th century AD – Martianus Capella uses it transitively, “to fear”.^[7][6]

Meanings

Verb

1. To tremble violently, quake.^[2][5]
2. (transitive, Late Latin) To fear.^[7]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c 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. ^ a b c Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
8. ^ Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
9. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson