cymba

Forms

cymba f (genitive cymbae); first declension^[1] Also spelled cumba, the form under which the OLD enters it, and cimba.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek κύμβη (kúmbē, “boat; cup”).^[2][4][1][3] Paulus' epitome of Festus already notes that the Greeks call a boat by this name.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in a comedy of Afranius, in the second half of the 2nd century BC, where a speaker goes aboard a fishing boat, cumbam piscatoriam.^[2][5][6]

Semantic evolution

It was a small boat or skiff,^[2][4] whose invention Pliny the Elder ascribes to the Phoenicians.^[4] The poets used it especially of the boat in which Charon ferried the dead, as in Virgil and Horace,^[2][4] and Propertius uses it figuratively.^[7] Paulus' epitome of Festus reports that the Sabines called cumba what soldiers called a lectica, a litter.^[2]

Isidore uses it of the part of a ship that sits in the water.^[7][8] Medieval Latin kept it for a small boat or barge, including the tender of a merchant ship and a boat for cargo or grain.^[9]

Timeline

• second half of the 2nd century BC – Afranius has a fishing boat called cumba.^[2][6]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of a skiff.^[4][6]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil uses it of Charon's boat.^[4][6]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder ascribes the invention of the skiff to the Phoenicians.^[4][6]
• c. 560–636 AD – Isidore uses it of the part of a ship below the waterline.^[7][6]

Meanings

Noun

1. A small boat, a skiff.^[2][4]
2. The boat of Charon, which ferried the dead.^[2][4]
3. (Sabine) A litter.^[2]
4. The part of a ship's hull that lies in the water.^[7]

Word family

• cymbium

Usage notes

Döderlein groups it with scapha and linter as skiffs meant only for short distances and for crossing rivers, unlike navis, a ship for long voyages.^[10]

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 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 e f g h i Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
6. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ a b c d Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
8. ^ Goetz, Georg (1888–1923), Corpus glossariorum Latinorum, Leipzig: Teubner; vols. VI–VII Thesaurus glossarum emendatarum, digital ed. CGLO, Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
9. ^ Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
10. ^ Döderlein, Ludwig (1874), Döderlein’s Hand-book of Latin Synonymes, tr. H. H. Arnold, Andover: W. F. Draper