desiderium

Forms

dēsīderium n (genitive dēsīderiī or dēsīderī); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It is formed from Latin dēsīderō (“to miss, long for”) + -ium.^[2][3][1] De Vaan lists dēsīderō with cōnsīderō (“to examine”) under sīdus (“star”), which he traces to Proto-Italic *sīdos (“mark, target”): following Rix, the verb would first have meant “to come off a goal”; he finds the older link with ⟨*sweid-⟩ “to shine” not very specific.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan and Köbler date it from Ennius,^[4][5] who writes of mourning for Romulus: pectora … tenet dēsīderium, “longing grips their hearts”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Dēsīderium is “longing” for something lost or absent (Terence: magnō dēsīderiō fuit eī fīlius, “he missed his son greatly”), and “grief, regret” for the dead (Cicero, Catullus).^[2][6][1] It is also the person longed for, “darling”: Cicero writes to his wife mea lūx, meum dēsīderium, and Catullus calls Lesbia dēsīderiō meō nitentī.^[2] From the sense “need, want” (Cicero: the needs of nature) it comes to mean an expressed wish, “a request, petition” (Seneca).^[2][1]

Church Latin glosses it “desire, lust, yearning for, pining for”.^[7]

Timeline

• 204–169 BC – Ennius: pectora … tenet dēsīderium.^[2][5]
• 190–159 BC – Terence: magnō dēsīderiō fuit eī fīlius.^[2][5]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero: mea lūx, meum dēsīderium.^[2][5]
• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca uses it for a request.^[2][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. longing, desire (for something lost or absent).^[2][6][1][7]
2. Grief, regret (for the dead).^[2][6][1]
3. An object of longing, darling.^[2]
4. A want, need.^[2][1]
5. A request, petition.^[2]

Word family

• dēsīderōsus

Related words

• dēsīderābilis
• dēsīderātiō
• dēsīderō
• cōnsīderō
• sīdus

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ 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
5. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson