degenero

Forms

dēgenerō (present infinitive dēgenerāre, perfect active dēgenerāvī, supine dēgenerātum); first conjugation^[1] Valerius Maximus has a passive dēgenerātum erat.^[2]

Etymology

The OLD and the TLL take it as from Latin dē- (“down, away from”) + genus (“birth, race”), a verb in -ō;^[3][2][4][1] Lewis & Short and Wiktionary derive it from the adjective dēgener (“unworthy of one's race”).^[3][2][4][1] De Vaan traces genus to Proto-Indo-European *ǵenh₁-o/es- (“race, offspring”), from the root *ǵenh₁- (“to beget”) of gignō.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The OLD's first example is Cicero's On Ends, of people who degenerate so far that they seem to be born of themselves.^[3]

Semantic evolution

It means to fall away from an earlier, especially an ancestral, standard, as Cicero's man who did not fall short of the virtue of his ancestors, and Ovid's “daughter of Pandion, you degenerate!”^[3][4] Of plants it is to revert to a less developed state, as Virgil's fruits that forget their former juices;^[3][4][2] Servius notes that they usually turn worse, sometimes better.^[3][4][2] Transitively it means to be unworthy of, as Propertius calls the gods to witness that he has not disgraced his kin, and to cause deterioration, as Columella of love-making that weakens the spirit.^[3]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero of people falling away from their ancestors.^[3][6]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil of plants that degenerate.^[3][6]
• 57/46–12 BC – Propertius of being unworthy of one's kin.^[3][6]
• 1st century AD – Columella of causing deterioration.^[3][6]

Meanings

Verb

1. To fall away from an ancestral standard, degenerate, deteriorate; to fall short of.^[3][4][1]
2. Of plants, to revert to a less developed condition.^[3][4]
3. Transitively, to be unworthy of; to disgrace.^[3][1]
4. To cause deterioration in, corrupt.^[3][1]

Related words

• dēgener
• genus

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e 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 h i j k l m n o Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e f g Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ 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 Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de