decolor

Forms

dēcolor (genitive dēcolōris); third-declension one-termination adjective^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin dē- + color (“colour”),^[2][3][4] though the TLL allows that it may be a back-formation from dēcolōrō (“to discolour”).^[5] De Vaan traces color to Proto-Italic *kelōs- (“outside, aspect”) and Proto-Indo-European *ḱel-ōs (“cover, covering”), with a shift of meaning from “covering” to “colour”.^[6] Cognate with Old High German hulis and perhaps with Sanskrit शरस् (śáras-, “skin on milk”).^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler dates it from Cicero,^[4] whose verse translation of Sophocles in the Tusculan Disputations has dēcolōrem sanguinem, blood drained of its colour.^[2][7]

Semantic evolution

It means changed from its natural colour, discoloured or stained:^[2] Ovid has the Rhine discoloured with its own people's blood, and Pliny the Elder uses it of pitch and of a milky pearl.^[2][8] Poets apply it to dark-skinned peoples, such as the Indians in Propertius and Ovid.^[2][8] Figuratively it means shameful or degenerate: Virgil's worse and dēcolor age follows the golden one.^[2][9] Manuscripts sometimes confuse it with discolor.^[2][5]

Medieval writers keep the senses dark, colourless or pale, and figuratively ugly or worthless;^[10] a British gloss explains it as dēfōrmis.^[11]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of blood drained of colour.^[2][4]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil calls an age of decline dēcolor.^[2][4]
• 57/46–12 BC – Propertius applies it to a sunburnt Indian.^[2][4]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it of pitch and pearls.^[2][8][4]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Changed from its normal colour, discoloured, stained.^[2][7]
2. Dark-skinned, swarthy (of peoples).^[2][8]
3. (figurative) Shameful; degenerate, depraved.^[2][9]
4. (Medieval Latin) Pale; ugly, worthless.^[10][11]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Bianchi, Rossella; Lelli, Olga (2014), VOLI: Vocabolario di latino, Florence: Le Monnier
4. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
6. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
7. ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b c d Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
9. ^ a b Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
10. ^ a b Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
11. ^ a b 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