diaphragma

Forms

diaphragma n (genitive diaphragmatis); third declension^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek διάφραγμα (diáphragma, “partition, barrier; midriff”).^[1][2][3] The Greek word is from διαφράσσω (diaphrássō, “to barricade”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Celsus still wrote it in Greek letters, using the Latin phrase transversum saeptum for the midriff.^[5][6][7] As a Latin word it appears in the medical writer Caelius Aurelianus, meaning the diaphragm.^[5][6][2]

Semantic evolution

Caelius Aurelianus explains it with Latin words such as discrimen and discretorium (“divider”),^[7][6] and the gynaecology of Vindicianus has it too.^[7]

Medieval glossaries and medical writers kept it for the midriff,^[8][3] and used it also for a partition of the nose and for the pericardium.^[2] A British anatomist describes it as a thin membrane dividing the region of the vital organs from that of the organs of nutrition.^[3] English borrowed it in the late 14th century.^[4]

Timeline

• 5th century AD – Caelius Aurelianus uses it for the diaphragm.^[5][2]
• late 14th century – English borrows it, first as diafragma.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. The diaphragm, midriff.^[5][6][8]
2. (Medieval Latin) A partition, such as the septum of the nose; the pericardium.^[2][1]

Related words

• English diaphragm

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
3. ^ a b c Latham, R. E., D. R. Howlett, R. K. Ashdowne, et al. (1975–2013), Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, London: British Academy / Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b c d Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
8. ^ a b Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill