contritio

Forms

contrītiō f (genitive contrītiōnis); third declension^[1]

Etymology

It is formed from Latin conterō (“to grind, crush”) + -tiō, a noun of action.^[2][1][3] The verb conterō belongs to the family of terō (“to rub”),^[4] which goes back to Proto-Italic *tera- and Proto-Indo-European *terh₁- (“to rub”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The OLD includes it in the sense of dismay or grief.^[2] The earliest dated author the dictionaries cite is Lactantius, who foretells a time of distress and contritio such as there has never been since the beginning of the world.^[3][5]

Semantic evolution

In its literal sense the word meant a grinding or crushing, as of grain or of the bones of the body.^[3][5] Figuratively it meant a crushing of the spirit, grief or despondency,^[2][5] and in the older Latin Bible it also rendered words for ruin and calamity.^[3]

In Christian Latin it became the word for contrition, sorrow for one's sins,^[5][6][7] the sense in which English borrowed it about 1300, partly through Old French.^[8] Medieval texts also kept the sense of affliction, catastrophe or ruin.^[7]

Timeline

• c. 250–317 AD – Lactantius uses it of the distress of the last days.^[3][9]
• 354–430 AD – Augustine uses it of grief in the Confessions.^[5][9]
• c. 383–419/420 AD – Jerome uses it in the Vulgate, as in the book of Jeremiah.^[5][9]
• c. 1300 – Borrowed into English as contrition.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. A grinding, crushing or bruising.^[3][5]
2. Dismay, grief, despondency.^[2][5]
3. (Late Latin) Ruin, destruction, calamity.^[3][7][1]
4. (Ecclesiastical Latin) Contrition, sorrow for sin.^[5][6][7]

Related words

• English contrition

References

1. ^ a b c 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 f g Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b 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 f g h i Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
7. ^ a b c d Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
8. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
9. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de