Etymologically
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dego

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ˈdeː.ɡoː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [ˈdɛː.ɡo][1]

Forms

dēgō (present infinitive dēgere, perfect active dēgī); third conjugation, no passive, no supine stem[1] Late texts also have dēgeō and the perfect dēguī.[2]

Etymology

It is from Latin dē- + agō (“to drive, do”), contracted.[3][2][1] The grammarian Priscian explained ⟨dēgō⟩ as a syncope made for the sake of euphony.[2] The verb agō goes back to Proto-Indo-European *h₂eǵ-e/o- (“to drive, lead”).[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its earliest examples are in Plautus, “I spend the day in the forum from morning to night”, and in Ennius' “Romulus spends eternity in heaven”.[5][3]

Semantic evolution

It is to spend or pass one's life or time, and in Lucretius to carry on a fight.[3][5] Intransitively it is to live, as in Livy's girls who lived as orphans, and to live on, as Pliny the Elder's happy people who live to a great age.[3] Paulus' abridgement of Festus says that the ancients used it for exspectāre “to wait”.[3]

Church Latin glosses it “live, spend time”.[6]

Timeline

  • c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of spending the day in the forum.[5][7]
  • 204–169 BC – Ennius of Romulus in heaven.[3][7]
  • 96–55 BC – Lucretius of carrying on a fight.[3][7]
  • 59 BC–17 AD – Livy of living as orphans.[3][7]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To spend, pass time or one's life.[3][5][1]
  2. To live, dwell; to live on, continue.[3][1]
  3. To wait.[3]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c 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 Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  4. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  5. ^ a b c d Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ 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