cura

Pronunciation

• IPA (Classical): [ˈkuː.ra]^[1]
• IPA (Ecclesiastical): [ˈkuː.ra]^[1]

Forms

cūra f (genitive cūrae); first declension^[1] The spelling coira and coera lasted into the 1st century BC, and an inscription has qura.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Italic *kʷois-ā- (“care, watch”), inherited from Proto-Indo-European *kʷeys- (“to heed”), an s-present of the root *kʷei- “to take notice”.^[2][1] De Vaan calls this a possible rather than a certain etymology, and the OLD marks the origin as doubtful.^[2][3] Cognate with Paelignian coisatens (“they took care”) and, if not borrowed from Latin, Umbrian kuratu, and further with Celtic verbs for seeing such as Old Irish ad·cí (“sees”), and with Avestan cōišt (“granted, allotted”) and Avestan tkaēša- (“teacher”).^[2] Inscriptions of the 2nd and 1st centuries BC still write coira and coera.^[2][1]

Varro derived it from cor and ūrere, “because it burns the heart”, an explanation repeated by Servius and Festus;^[4] Lewis and Short connect it with cavēre.^[5] De Vaan takes sēcūrus “free from care” as formed directly from it, while cūriōsus may be a back-formation from incūriōsus.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is found from Plautus onwards;^[2] the earliest quotation in the OLD is from Ennius, who writes of helping someone or lightening their care.^[3][6] Köbler too dates it from Ennius.^[6]

Semantic evolution

Its two main senses were anxiety or worry, and careful attention or pains, as in Ennius' “attending with great care”.^[3][5] From attention came the literary work one labours over, the medical treatment of a patient (Cato promises a quick cure “by this treatment”), and the rearing of animals and plants, the subject of Virgil's Georgics.^[3]

It also meant concern or love, and poets called a beloved person or thing someone's cura.^[3] In public life it was the administration or charge of something, the command of an army, the guardianship of minors in law, and a task or post.^[3][5] Medieval Latin added the cure of souls, the spiritual charge of a parish, the office of a parish priest and the Mass.^[7][6] The Romance languages keep it as Italian, Spanish and Portuguese cura and Old French cure,^[1] from which the English word (c. 1300) took first the sense “care” and, in the late 14th century, “medical treatment”.^[8]

Timeline

• 204–169 BC – Ennius uses it of anxiety and of careful attention.^[3][6]
• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus writes of wasting away with care and tears.^[3][6]
• 234–149 BC – Cato uses it of a medical treatment and of eagerness for food.^[3][6]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of the administration of a province and of a task.^[3][6]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil writes of the care of oxen and calls a beloved a cura.^[3][6]
• 823–825 – A capitulary has the medieval sense of spiritual charge.^[6]
• c. 1300 – English Cure is borrowed into English.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. Anxiety, worry, distress; a particular worry.^[3][5]
2. Careful attention, pains, diligence.^[3][5]
3. The object of one's study; a written work.^[3][1]
4. The treatment of a patient or illness; the rearing of animals or plants.^[3][1]
5. Concern, solicitude; love; a beloved person or thing.^[3]
6. Administration, charge, command, and in law guardianship.^[3][5]
7. A task, a post.^[3]
8. (Medieval Latin) The cure of souls; the spiritual charge of a parish; the Mass.^[7]

Word family

• curagendarius
• cūragō
• cūriōsus
• cūrō
• sēcūrus
• domicurius
• sollicūrius
• cūrius
• incūria
• tricūrium

Related words

• English cure
• English curious
• English secure

Usage notes

Döderlein groups cura, thoughtful apprehension (opposed to incūria), with sollicitūdō, anxious disquiet, and angor, anguish, all of them directed at a future evil, whereas dolor and aegritūdō concern a present one.^[9]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
5. ^ a b c d e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ a b Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
8. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
9. ^ Döderlein, Ludwig (1874), Döderlein’s Hand-book of Latin Synonymes, tr. H. H. Arnold, Andover: W. F. Draper