dedo

Forms

dēdō (present infinitive dēdere, perfect active dēdidī, supine dēditum); third conjugation^[1] Livy's formula has the old passive infinitive dēdier.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is formed from Latin dē- (“away”) + dō (“to give”).^[2][4][1] The TLL compares Oscan dadid (“would have handed over”).^[4] De Vaan lists it under dō, from Proto-Indo-European *deh₃- (“to give”), noting that in compounds that verb merged with an old ⟨*-dō⟩ “to put”.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan dates it from Naevius.^[5] Plautus has cūr tū … mē mortī dēdere optās?, “why do you want to give me up to death?”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Dēdere is “to give up, surrender, hand over” (Terence: ancillās dēdō, “I hand over the maids”), and above all of a people or army, sē dēdere, “to surrender” (Caesar).^[2][3][1] Dēdere noxae was to hand over a slave or animal in compensation for damage it had done.^[2] It is “to consign, abandon” to death or a condition, and reflexively “to devote oneself” to a pursuit or a person (Cicero: Cato, to whom I gave myself wholly from youth), and to devote one's ears or attention.^[2][1] It is also “to assign, put at someone's disposal” (Plautus: hunc tibi dēdō diem).^[2]

Church Latin glosses it “to give up, yield, surrender, consign, devote, dedicate”.^[6]

Timeline

• c. 235–200 BC – Naevius uses it.^[5][7]
• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus: mē mortī dēdere.^[2][7]
• 190–159 BC – Terence: ancillās dēdō.^[2][7]
• c. 50 BC – Caesar of a surrender.^[2][7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To give up, hand over, surrender.^[2][3][1][6]
2. (sē dēdere) To surrender, give in.^[2][1]
3. To consign, abandon (to death or a condition).^[2][1][6]
4. (reflexive) To devote oneself (to).^[2][1][6]
5. To assign, put at someone's disposal.^[2]

Word family

• deditim
• dēditiō
• dēditīcius
• dēditus

Related words

• dō
• prōdō

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
5. ^ a b c de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b c d Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
7. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de