Etymologically
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crepitus

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ˈkrɛ.pɪ.tʊs][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [ˈkrɛː.pi.tus][1]

Forms

crepitus m (genitive crepitūs); fourth declension[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin crepō (“to rattle, creak”) + -tus, an action noun.[2][1][3] De Vaan traces crepō to Proto-Italic *krepa- and Proto-Indo-European *ḱrep- (“to rattle, crackle”), an aorist root.[4] He compares Hittite karp(ii̯e/a)-tta(ri) (“to be angry, rage”) and Sanskrit कृपते (kr̥pate, “to wean, mourn”).[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan, Köbler and the TLL date it from Naevius.[4][5][3] Plautus has the creak of door hinges.[6]

Semantic evolution

It is a short sharp sound or a run of them, creaking, cracking, clashing, the crackling of flames.[2] Lewis & Short find it in good prose: Lucretius has the flapping of canvas, Varro the noise of bridles, Cicero the chattering of teeth.[6] With ⟨digitōrum⟩ it is the snapping of fingers, as in Martial and Quintilian.[2] It is also a fart: Plautus threatens to knock a barley-fed one out of each of them.[2] Döderlein contrasts it, a single or repeated sharp sound, with fragor, a crash, and strepitus, a loud din.[7] English took it as crepitus about 1820.[8]

Timeline

  • c. 235–200 BC – Naevius uses it.[4][3][5]
  • c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of creaking hinges and of a fart.[2][6][5]
  • 96–55 BC – Lucretius of flapping canvas.[6][5]
  • 40–102/103 AD – Martial of snapping fingers.[2][5]
  • c. 1820 – English borrows it.[8]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A short sharp sound, a rattling, creaking, clashing; the crackling of flames.[2][6][1]
  2. crepitus digitōrum, a snapping of the fingers.[2]
  3. crepitus ventris, a fart, flatulence.[2][1]
  4. (Ecclesiastical Latin) An explosion.[9]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  4. ^ a b c d 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 Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  6. ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ Döderlein, Ludwig (1874), Döderlein’s Hand-book of Latin Synonymes, tr. H. H. Arnold, Andover: W. F. Draper
  8. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  9. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson