deturbo

Forms

dēturbō (present infinitive dēturbāre, perfect active dēturbāvī, supine dēturbātum); first conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin dē- + turbō (“to disturb, throw into confusion”).^[2][3][1] turbō is made from turba (“turmoil, crowd”), whose origin de Vaan finds uncertain: he doubts the link with Sanskrit त्वरते (tvarate, “hurries”) favoured by Pokorny and Meiser, and also considers Ancient Greek στρέφω (stréphō, “to turn”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus has it first, in the Captivi, of someone who upsets a whole meat rack on arrival.^[2][5]

Semantic evolution

It is to throw down violently, upset, or knock someone from a position: a character in Plautus threatens to knock a man off the battlements, and Caesar has the Romans driven from the rampart with stones.^[2][6] Lewis & Short think it was perhaps first a military word.^[6] Figuratively it is to cast someone down from a position or a state of mind, as Cicero has opponents wishing to remove a consul from guarding the state, and Plautus a storm that knocked out someone's sense of shame.^[2][6] In Nonius it is glossed by dēiciō and dēmoveō.^[3]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of upsetting a meat rack and of knocking a man from the battlements.^[2][5]
• c. 50 BC – Caesar of driving soldiers from a rampart.^[6][5]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero of removing a consul from his post.^[2][5]

Meanings

Verb

1. To bring tumbling down, upset, topple; to dislodge, drive headlong.^[2][6][1]
2. Figuratively, to cast down from a position or state; to drive out a feeling.^[2][1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
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 Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press