Etymologically
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discumbo

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [dɪsˈkʊm.boː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [disˈkum.bo][1]

Forms

discumbō (present infinitive discumbere, perfect active discubuī, supine discubitum); third conjugation[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin dis- + -cumbō (“to lie down”).[2][3][1] De Vaan reconstructs the nasal present behind -cumbō and cubō (“to lie”) as Proto-Italic *kumbe/o- (“to lie down”), comparing Faliscan cupat (“lies”) and Paelignian incubat; since the root is limited to Italic and Celtic, he leaves its Indo-European origin uncertain.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus has it first, in the Mercator, of going to bed at night.[2][4][5]

Semantic evolution

In Plautus it is to lie down to sleep; from Varro on it is mostly to take one's place at table for a meal, as in Cicero's “we all lay down to dinner except her”.[2][6] Lewis & Short note that this use is especially common from the Augustan period on, beside accumbō.[6] Church Latin glosses it to sit down or recline at table.[7]

Timeline

  • c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of going to bed.[2][5]
  • 116–27 BC – Varro of taking one's place at a meal.[2][5]
  • 98–115 AD – Tacitus of reclining at a feast.[2][5]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To lie down to sleep, go to bed.[2][6][1]
  2. To take one's place at table; to recline at a meal.[2][6][7][1]

Word family

  • discubitio
  • discubitus

Usage notes

An ancient list of word distinctions says that accumbere is to lie down to rest, discumbere to lie down to a meal, and dēcumbere to lie down in sickness.[3]

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. ^ 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 Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  6. ^ a b c d 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