cylindrus

Forms

cylindrus m (genitive cylindrī); second declension^[1] A Greek nominative cylindros is found in Martianus Capella.^[2] Medieval spellings include cilindrus, chilindrus and chelindrus.^[3][4][5]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek κύλινδρος (kúlindros, “cylinder, roller”),^[6][1][7] from κυλίνδω (kulíndō, “to roll”),^[3][8] which Etymonline calls of unknown origin.^[8] Isidore of Seville says the stone roller took its name from its rolling.^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Cato is the first to use it, telling the farmer to break up the soil and level it with a roller (cylindro) or a rammer.^[6][2]

Semantic evolution

From Cato the word passed to Cicero, who used it for the geometrical solid.^[2][6] Virgil has the threshing floor levelled with a huge roller,^[10][9] and Cicero reports Chrysippus' image of a cylinder that rolls once pushed.^[2] Pliny the Elder and Juvenal use it for a precious stone cut in the shape of a cylinder, worn in necklaces and earrings.^[6][11]

Medieval Latin kept the roller and the cylinder, and used it for a roller placed under loads and for a flail.^[4][5] In 15th-century England it named the chilindre, a cylindrical sundial,^[5] the sense in which English first took cylinder.^[8]

Timeline

• 234–149 BC – Cato uses it for a stone roller for levelling ground.^[6][3]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it for the geometrical cylinder.^[6][2][3]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil has a threshing floor levelled with a roller.^[10][11][3]
• 23/24–79 – Pliny the Elder uses it for gems cut as cylinders.^[6][3]
• c. 560–636 – Isidore defines it as a geometrical figure and as a rolling stone.^[9][3]
• late 14th century – English borrows it as chilindre, a cylindrical sundial.^[8]
• 15th century – An English glossary explains chilindrus as a level or an instrument for telling the hours.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. (geometry) A cylinder.^[6][10]
2. A stone roller for levelling ground.^[6][10]
3. A precious stone cut in the shape of a cylinder.^[6][11]
4. (Medieval Latin) A roller placed under a load; a flail.^[4]
5. (Medieval Latin) A cylindrical sundial.^[5]

Word family

• cylindrātus

Related words

• cylindricus
• English cylinder

Usage notes

Cylindrus is also the name of a cook in Plautus' Menaechmi.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
3. ^ a b c d e f g Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
4. ^ a b c Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
5. ^ a b c d e 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
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
8. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
9. ^ a b c Isidore of Seville, Etymologiarum sive Originum libri XX, ed. W. M. Lindsay (Oxford, 1911).
10. ^ a b c d Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ a b c Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn