convena

Forms

convena m (genitive convenae); first declension^[1] It is an adjective of either gender, and in the plural convenae it is used as a noun.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is from Latin conveniō (“to come together”) + -a,^[1][2][3] and the TLL compares advena (“newcomer”).^[5] Veniō “to come” goes back to Proto-Italic *gʷn-je/o- and Proto-Indo-European *gʷm-ie/o- (“to come”).^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in Plautus,^[7][5] in the Miles Gloriosus, where a character undertakes to bring two lovers together (quī amantīs ūnā inter sē facerem convenās).^[2][3][4]

Semantic evolution

As a plural noun it meant people who had gathered from elsewhere, strangers and refugees.^[2][3][4] Cato writes that many such newcomers came there from the countryside,^[5][2] Cicero that Romulus gathered shepherds and convenae and that Dionysius entrusted his bodyguard to such people and to savage barbarians,^[2][5] and Livy speaks of a plebs of shepherds and convenae who had deserted their own peoples.^[5][3] In later writers such as Solinus and Ammianus the adjective is used of rivers that flow together and of a crowd gathered from all sides.^[2][5][3] Servius distinguishes the indigenae, born in a place, the advenae, who come from one other place, and the convenae, who come from several.^[5]

As a proper name, Convenae was a community gathered by Pompey at the foot of the Pyrenees.^[2] In medieval Britain the word was used of incomers, and once of a brood of chickens.^[8]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it as an adjective, “meeting”.^[2][5][7]
• 234–149 BC – Cato uses the plural noun of newcomers from the countryside.^[5][2][7]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of the people Romulus gathered.^[2][5][7]
• 59 BC–17 AD – Livy speaks of a plebs of shepherds and convenae.^[5][7]
• c. 390 AD – Ammianus uses it of rivers flowing together.^[2][5][7]
• c. 400 AD – Servius distinguishes it from advena and indigena.^[5][7]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Coming together, meeting; of rivers, flowing together.^[2][3][5]

Noun

1. (plural) People gathered from different places; strangers, refugees, immigrants.^[2][3][4]
2. (Medieval Latin) Incomers; a brood of poultry.^[8]

Related words

• advena
• conveniō

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
4. ^ a b c d Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
6. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
7. ^ a b c d e f g Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
8. ^ a b Latham, R. E., D. R. Howlett, R. K. Ashdowne, et al. (1975–2013), Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, London: British Academy / Oxford University Press