cooperculum

Forms

cooperculum n (genitive cooperculī); second declension^[1] Also spelled coperculum.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is formed from Latin cooperiō (“to cover”) + -culum.^[2][1] The TLL compares operculum (“lid”).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in Pliny the Elder, meaning a lid.^[4][5][6]

Semantic evolution

It was a rare word,^[4] used for the lid of a jar, a coffin and the like;^[2] Apuleius and Palladius also have it.^[4][5] Manuscripts often waver between cooperculum and coperculum.^[3]

In Medieval Latin it meant a lid or a superstructure, and more broadly a covering or wrapping, a covert feather of a bird and the shell of a crab;^[7] Niermeyer also records it as a blanket.^[8] It is the source of Italian coperchio, French couvercle and Spanish cobijo.^[3][5]

Timeline

• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it for a lid.^[4][5][6]
• c. 125–175 AD – Apuleius uses it in the Metamorphoses.^[5][6]
• end of the 4th or beginning of the 5th century AD – Palladius uses it.^[4][6]

Meanings

Noun

1. A lid of a jar, coffin and the like; a cover.^[2][4]
2. (Medieval Latin) A covering, wrapping; a blanket.^[7][8]
3. (Medieval Latin) A covert feather of a bird.^[7]

Related words

• operculum

References

1. ^ a b 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 Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c d e Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ a b c Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
8. ^ a b Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill