diligentia

Forms

dīligentia f (genitive dīligentiae); first declension^[1]

Etymology

It is formed from Latin dīligēns (“careful, attentive”) + -ia.^[2][3][1] dīligēns is the present participle of dīligō (“to esteem, love”), from ⟨dis-⟩ and legō (“to choose, gather”), which goes back to Proto-Indo-European *leǵ- (“to collect”).^[2][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus has cūrāte haec sultis magnā dīligentiā, “please see to these things with great care”.^[2] Köbler dates it from Cicero.^[5]

Semantic evolution

Dīligentia is “carefulness, attentiveness, assiduity”, and with a genitive careful attention to something.^[2][6][1] L&S group it with industria, assiduitās, sēdulitās, studium and cūra.^[6] It also means “thrift, economical management”: the Rhetorica ad Herennium defines it as accūrāta cōnservātiō suōrum, “careful keeping of one's own”, and Nepos speaks of acquiring things dīligentiā rather than by spending.^[2][1]

Church Latin glosses it “diligence, accuracy, carefulness, attentiveness”.^[7] English diligence comes from it, partly through Old French, in the mid-14th century.^[8]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus: magnā dīligentiā.^[2][5]
• 190–159 BC – Terence uses it.^[2][5]
• 86/82 BC – The Rhetorica ad Herennium uses it of thrift.^[2][5]
• mid-14th century – English diligence.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. Carefulness, attentiveness, diligence, assiduity.^[2][6][1][7]
2. thrift, economical management.^[2][1]

Related words

• dīligēns
• dīligenter
• dīligō

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 i j 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. ^ 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 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
8. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com